Pain
by Nanya
Summary: A What If story in the "Relationships" series exploring a very possible reality if Yuuno had been sent into the field with Vita and Arf. A 3-part one-shot with 2 possible endings.
1. Pain

Pain

A "Relationships" Series What If Story

Co-Written with RadiantBeam

Disclaimer: We own none of the characters involved

Note: As humans, we have infinite curiosity, it's why fanfiction is written. But sometimes, we wonder what might have been for a story if a plot point comes up and is never explored. This story explores the possibility if Yuuno had been forced to go out to fight on the field next to Arf and Vita. So, no one can complain about a wasted plot.

Warning: Darker tones ahead. Reading this may make you want to seriously, _seriously_ hurt someone, or cry, or both.

Before anyone says that this belongs as a part of the main story, it's got _two_ separate endings, so, it's its own story.

There will be two endings to this what if story. Yes, we did an AU ending to our AU story.

* * *

Yuuno was down.

He was out.

He was amazed he wasn't dead.

Or at least, he didn't _think_ he was dead. After all, if he was dead, would he still be feeling this incredible pain? Would he still hear the voices of Arf and Vita, faded as they were? Would he still be able to see the wreckage of battle around him, even if his vision was failing?

And the _pain_...

A burning sensation in his chest, like he'd been shot; a clenching pain, like someone had closed their fingers around his heart and was squeezing tightly, without remorse.

It _hurt_.

It was so simple, wasn't it? Back up the rookies, make sure that they got out alive, everyone comes out of it alive. Simple, easy, how did it turn out this way?

"I guess, maybe I should have dodged." He managed to groan out, wincing with each word.

"Shut up!" Vita yelled at him as she surveyed the battle area. "You better not say anything until we get you to a hospital!" There were tears falling down her face as she glared at him, at the area, and at the idiot who got Yuuno into this situation.

Yuuno blew out a long breath. "Don't think I'll last that long," he said weakly.

"You'll last! You'll damn well last, you idiot!" Vita whipped her head around. "Arf! Where are the medics?"

The familiar, in her full adult form, looked just as angry, just as frustrated as the small Knight. "They're coming as quickly as they can."

"Is Shamal with them?"

"She insisted on coming as soon as she heard Yuuno's name." Arf looked around. "How are the rookies?"

"They're fine." Vita gritted her teeth. "The stupid moron on the ground held his shield long enough to protect the stragglers, even with hellfire raining down on him."

"Right, Yuuno, oh gods! Yuuno!" Arf's eyes widened as she saw him start to pale. The two quickly stripped him out of his shirt, finding his chest bleeding heavily as they did what they could to stop it. "Stop bleeding, dammit! Yuuno! You promised us you would come back! You stop bleeding right now!" Arf yelled at him, tears falling down her face as hers and Vita's hands got more and more covered in blood as they did what they could to stop it.

Even with his life bleeding out of him, Yuuno chuckled. "Sorry... I'm causing a of trouble for you two..."

"Don't talk!" Vita barked. "Save your strength, Shamal will be here any minute!"

Yuuno kept talking. "Just... can you apologize to Nanoha and Fate for me? Tell them... I really messed up this time."

It was the last thing he said before everything faded to black. The last thing he heard was Arf screaming his name.

"Yuuno! YUUUNO!" Arf screamed, shaking him. "Get up! Come on! Get up!"

"Don't you dare die! Don't you dare die on me!" Vita yelled loudly. "SHAMAL! MEDIC! WE NEED MEDICS! HURRY UP!"

Shamal arrived a few moments later to the scene as the two were trying their best to try and get Yuuno to stay with them. Shamal ran to the group. "We're here, Vita, Arf..."

"Shamal! Yuuno! He... He's not... Hurry, please!" Vita yelled, pushing on the wounds, trying to keep Yuuno's blood in his body.

Shamal only had to take one look at Yuuno before she got to work, easily sweeping Arf and Vita aside. The first trick, she knew, was to stop the blood flow; only then could she focus on saving his life.

"Shamal?" Arf was practically whimpering.

"He's still alive." Shamal's voice was quiet, focused, but relieved nonetheless. "Just barely, but he's still fighting." As she started to apply pressure to his chest and signaled for another medic, she looked at Vita. "What the hell happened?"

Vita could tell, then, just how scared Shamal was. It was the only time she ever cursed.

Clenching her fists, Vita trembled and glared at where the rookies had left. She knew that they weren't totally at blame, she knew it. It didn't make her feel better. "That IDIOT!" She yelled, tears falling down her face. "He's such an idiot! Puts up a barrier to make sure that everyone gets out safely, and the instant that it goes down, he takes an attack that he should have been able to block. But, no, he's so tired that his own personal field isn't active and it cuts into him!" Vita screamed and stomped on the ground, cracking it.

As more medics gathered around Yuuno, Shamal took a deep breath and quietly retreated, signaling for Vita and Arf to join her.

"Are you sure you should be leaving him alone?" Arf asked anxiously.

"He's fine. For the moment." Shamal bit her lip. "It's bad. He took a direct hit. By some miracle the blast missed his heart, but he's still sustained critical damage. I need to take him straight to the medical ward."

Shamal took another deep breath.

"One of you has to tell them," she whispered. "One of you has to tell Fate and Nanoha."

"I'll do it." Vita all but growled it. "I was the one who agreed to take the damn mission."

"Shamal... Do... Do you think Yuuno will..?" Arf asked, looking at her bloody hands and trembling horribly.

"We'll do everything we can, Arf. Everything we can." Shamal said to her, looking at the scene grimly.

Vita trembled, tears falling down her face. "Why?" She asked no one in particular. "Why does everyone I try to protect get so hurt?"

Shamal's eyes softened slightly; she stepped forward and hugged Vita quickly, gently, before releasing her to go back to Yuuno.

Arf looked at the small Knight worriedly. "Vita?"

Vita blew out a long, hard breath. "You go with Yuuno, Arf. I... I have to tell Nanoha and Fate what happened."

Arf nodded, trembling, before hugging Vita as well. "I'm sorry... I couldn't protect him either."

Vita nodded and hugged her back. "I... I'll go tell them. Just make sure to stay with him."

Arf nodded and went to help Shamal as Vita took trembling steps away from the scene. Along the way, she glared at the rookies, who were wondering what happened. She could feel rage, _intense_, **blinding** rage that threatened to swell up and make her take Graf Eisen and do things that would get her, Hayate and all the Wolkenritter in trouble.

That was the only reason that she settled for glaring, before she left, quickly.

(---)

Even if Vita wanted to immediately go to the house and break the news to Nanoha and Fate, to better deal with their reactions, she knew she couldn't do that. For one thing, it was almost midnight, and for another her clothes were all bloody.

She took only the minimum amount of time to stop at base to switch out of her Barrier Jacket, simply washing the blood off before changing back into her uniform.

After changing, she braced herself for the worst possible mission.

(---)

Nanoha yawned tiredly, turning over sleepily and nuzzling into Fate's neck. The two had finally managed to settle down to sleep a few minutes ago, contenting themselves with waking to find Yuuno slipping quietly between them when he returned. The night was quiet, and Fate's arm felt nice around her waist.

At first, she thought she was dreaming when the doorbell sounded. When it went off again, she opened her eyes and groaned. "Fate-chan..."

"Yeah, I know." Fate yawned. "Want to stay up here?"

"No, I'll come down. The bed gets cold when I'm alone."

Fate smiled and kissed her on the lips. "Come on." She yawned, wondering who would be there at this hour of the day. Getting out of bed, the two were quick to wrap robes around their bodies and head downstairs.

The doorbell went off again, causing Nanoha to twitch slightly. "Remind me to turn off the doorbell late at night."

Fate nodded, but had no intention of doing that. Opening the door, she blinked in surprise. "Vita? What brings..." Fate trailed off, seeing how stiff, nervous and terrible Vita looked, almost as if someone had done something horrible to one of the knights. "What's wrong?"

Nanoha peered curiously over Fate's shoulder. "Vita-chan? It's late..."

"Yeah. I know. Sorry. Something kind of happened." Vita took a deep breath, hoping it would relax her. It didn't work. "Is Vivio up?"

"She's at Momoko and Shiro's tonight. She wanted to sleep over."

_Oh, thank you,_ Vita thought. She hesitated, fidgeted, and wondered if she should break her news on the doorstep or come inside.

Fate sensed her confusion, stepping back. "Why don't you come in? It's late, and kind of chilly tonight."

Vita smiled weakly. "Yeah, thanks."

When they were all inside and in the living room, Vita grimaced, she really, _really_ did not look forward to what she had to say. "Nanoha... Fate... Arf, Yuuno and myself... We... We had a mission today..." The two of them nodded, they figured that when Yuuno had slipped out of the bed. "And... There was a surprise attack." Vita fidgeted, she could FEEL the tension levels rising dramatically.

"Yuuno-kun... Oh gods!" Nanoha's face was pale, her eyes wide as her body trembled. "Did... Is he... Vita-chan, tell me! Is he dead?"

Vita plunged on; now that she was talking, it felt like she simply couldn't stop.

"Arf and I got seperated with a small group of recruits, and Yuuno... he was stuck behind with another group. One of the attackers... he could match Yuuno's rank." Vita heard her voice break. "I couldn't get there in time. Yuuno must have held that shield for at least an hour, despite the constant attacks. He..." She closed her eyes, shuddered. "He only dropped it for a moment. He needed to catch his breath. He was weakening. The minute the barrier dropped, the bastard let off another shot."

"He got out of the way." Fate's voice trembled. "Vita, tell us he got out of the way."

Vita slowly opened her eyes.

"There were recruits behind him," she whispered.

"Y...You're lying! Right? Please, oh, PLEASE! Vita! Tell me that you're lying!" Nanoha had a scared look on her face, her mind flashing back to when she was little, seeing her father in the hospital.

Vita had her eyes closed and she shook her head. "He... There was so much blood... So much... Shamal... she got there... But..."

"He... He can't be dead!" Fate trembled, her eyes watering.

"He was so weak... So pale... Shamal said he was still alive but... I don't know!" Vita suddenly cried out. "I don't know! So much blood, I couldn't stop it! I wanted to stop it, I just couldn't!"

It still haunted her; the image of Yuuno, pale as a sheet as red blood poured from the wound on his chest, too much blood, the blood had looked so bright...

With great effort, Vita forced herself not to cry out again.

"Shamal took him straight to the medical ward," she said. "Arf went with them. He was still fighting. Just barely, she said, but he was still alive. He wanted..." She swallowed hard. "He wanted me to tell you guys he was sorry, that he really messed up this time." She cleared her throat. "I don't think he'll die, but... you deserve to hear it."

"We... We need to go, Vita..." Nanoha said stiffly and went to her room to get some clothes on, Fate following a moment later.

Vita sat in the chair, her hands shaking horribly as she stared at them. She could still see the blood on them, so much blood, so much...

She nearly jumped out of her skin when she felt a hand on her shoulder. Looking up, she blinked as Nanoha, dressed in light clothes, nodded at her. "Come on, Vita-chan... We're going to go see Yuuno-kun."

Nanoha nodded, she knew, she knew all too well.

(---)

The trio quickly made their way to the emergency ward, Arf was there waiting for them, trembling, her hands were still bloody, she hadn't bothered to wash them off, just sitting on the chairs, looking at her hands as she trembled. She looked up and sniffled before crying and hugging Fate, who held her, the blond's tears fell silently as the group sat, and waited, and waited.

It would be hours before they would hear any news at all.

As they sat, a flurry of movement made Fate blink and look up in confusion; her eyes widened as Lindy gently settled down next to her, Chrono and Amy not far behind. "Mom? How did you..."

"My social network is wide and fast as the speed of light." Lindy smiled gently at her daughter. "I thought you could use some company. Nanoha," she added, "Momoko called. She said she can keep Vivio as long as you need her to."

Nanoha nodded, silent, rocking back and forth silently, her face unreadable. She didn't think she could say or do anything more, she had to be strong, she needed to be strong, she would wait, she would...

Totally start crying the instant she was pulled into a hug by Lindy, who moved right next to her. "I... I can't... I can't..." She hiccuped as she broke down in a mass of sobs and tears.

"Can't what?" Lindy's voice was soft, her embrace gentle as she cradled Nanoha in her arms. As she comforted the brunette, Amy and Chrono both gathered around Fate, offering her silent support. Well, silent in Chrono's case. "Hey," Amy whispered.

Fate tried to smile, failed miserably. "Hi."

Chrono looked at Arf, who was looking anywhere but at Fate or Nanoha, tears still falling down her face and frowned lightly at the blood on her hands, but didn't say anything. He glanced across the hall, where Vita was sitting, completely silent. She looked up and flinched slightly, before looking back down.

Amy rubbed Fate's back softly as the blond trembled. "Fate, it's okay. Don't hold back." She sighed as the blond shook her head softly. "Fate, don't hold this in, you don't want it to eat away at you." She whispered softly.

"W...why?" Fate sniffled, her face scrunching up as she tried to stop her tears.

Amy could only guess as to what Fate was asking, but she knew the blond well enough to try. "Why didn't he get out of the way?" she offered.

"Why... Why did this happen to him?" She asked, her voice trembling. "Why did it happen to him?"

Amy was silent and shook her head. "I... I don't know." She whispered softly.

"His way of thinking was simple." Chrono finally spoke up. "He knew what he was doing. He knew that if he got out of the way, the recruits would be killed. He figured he was strong enough to survive the blast, and decided to take the risk so he wouldn't lose anyone."

Fate nodded, she knew that. Heck, she had gotten a few injuries herself by doing things similar. It didn't make it any easier to accept.

Lindy sighed as she held Nanoha, who was passed out. Rocking back and forth softly, she hoped to keep the demons of the younger woman's mind away, if even for a little while. _I wish I could promise you two that he will be alright. I wish I could promise you that._ She thought sadly, her shirt damp with tears from Nanoha's crying.

They lost track of time. It could have been minutes that passed as they sat there, or hours; it was hard to say. There was no clock on the wall to tell them how much time had passed. At some point Fate rested her head against Amy's shoulder and fell asleep, just as exhausted by everything as Nanoha was.

Just as Vita was beginning to wonder if she'd have to charge the doors to get any news, Shamal came out of the room.

She looked like hell; pale, her eyes tired, her body trembling slightly. Clearly, she'd been ignoring her own needs to tend to Yuuno and the other injured. As she came outside, both Nanoha and Fate stirred as Arf stood up. "Shamal?" she asked softly.

Shaking her head, Shamal dropped into a chair. "It's bad," she whispered. "We managed to stop the blood, so he isn't in danger of bleeding to death anymore, but we can't get his body to stabilize itself. He used up too much power, and he used it too fast."

"What are you saying?" Vita frowned. "I only saw him put up one huge shield."

"He threw up a smaller one before he got hit." Exhausted, Shamal rubbed her eyes. "That's what did him in, that tiny shield, and that explains why he survived the blow. We..." She swallowed hard. "We lost him once the way here, but I managed to bring him back. Right now we're trying to get his magical levels stable again, or else his body will shut down."

"I..." Shamal rubbed her forehead tiredly. "I did all I could..." She slumped tiredly, showing that she was as tired as she looked.

Vita clenched her fists together. "I... This is my fault... I should have refused the mission, or I should have stayed with him."

"Some familiar I am..." Arf muttered. She had went with him, promising Fate that she would protect him, and she had failed, horribly.

"You can't blame yourself," Shamal murmured. "No one saw this coming. The attack was unexpected. It's a miracle there were no causalities." Though at the rate things were going, Yuuno would die.

After a moment, she lifted her head, looking at Fate and Nanoha. "I'm sorry," she said. "I wish I had better news."

They nodded softly, and Nanoha forced a small smile onto her face. "Shamal... Thank you... For doing your best." The pain in her voice was evident, but she still tried to smile.

Shamal nodded quietly before she rose again. "I have to go back in," she said. "I can't leave him alone for too long."

She got tired nods from everyone, but Vita grabbed her arm, causing her to look at her. _Take care of him._

Shamal nodded at the mental request before going back inside.

"Nanoha..." Lindy said softly as the younger woman trembled. "Shamal's working hard."

Nanoha looked at Vita. "Please, please tell me that the bastard didn't get away."

Vita smirked coldly at that. "Like hell he got away. I didn't go after him myself, but Arf chased him down and gave him one hell of a beating in my place." That was the only reason that it had taken Arf so long to get to Yuuno, otherwise she would have beaten the small knight to where Yuuno was.

Arf was hugged tightly by Fate, who rubbed her familiar's back and thanking her. "Fate... I... I don't deserve it..." She slumped, her eyes reflecting her sadness. "I... I couldn't protect Yuuno. It's my fault."

Fate just shook her head and tightened her grip on Arf. "You got the man who hurt him," she choked out. "That's what matters."

Arf nodded and hugged Fate tighter. She still felt miserable about everything that happened.

Vita twitched gripping her knees tightly. _If only I hadn't... If I hadn't taken this mission, or put it off for a bit..._ She hated this, hated waiting. It was just as bad as when she held Nanoha all those years ago after she had gotten injured badly.

"Lindy?"

"Nanoha?" She blinked as Nanoha looked at her in trepidation.

"What.. What will happen now?" She asked, not as the Ace of Aces, but as a young woman scared stiff for someone she loved.

Lindy hesitated for a moment before she spoke. "It... it all depends on whether or not they can stabilize the magic in Yuuno's body. It isn't unusual for people to die during the procedure, or to come close to death, and Shamal already said he died once before, but was brought back."

She knew it wasn't the best thing to say, but it was the truth. She wished that it wasn't so true though.

Amy looked at Chrono, who nodded. "I'm sorry, I need to leave." He kissed his wife, before nodding to the others.

"I understand." Fate nodded at him, her voice trembling lightly. "Thank you, for showing up, brother."

"Chrono." Lindy's soft voice made him look at her.

Chrono smirked. "Don't worry, Mom. I won't do anything stupid."

She nodded as he left, sighing heavily. It was times like these that she wanted to curse the world for all it was worth.

It would be hours sat in silence before any news was heard.

Shamal came out only to find the small group asleep; Nanoha was still cuddled against Lindy, Fate dozing between Arf and Amy. Vita sat by herself, arms crossed over her chest and her head bowed as she slept. Moving quietly, Shamal gently stepped over to Vita and gave her a light shake.

Vita woke in an instant. "Shamal." She kept her voice low, mindful of the sleeping family. "Is he...?"

Shamal couldn't fight back the smile; despite her exhaustion, she was overjoyed. "We've managed to stabilize him," she said softly. "It's still touch and go from here, but his chances are much better." All she wanted to do was find a bed and fall asleep.

Vita sighed and hugged her, tears falling down her face as she couldn't keep the relief from crashing out of her. "Thank you... Thank you, Shamal."

Shamal winked as Vita let go and sat down, yawning tiredly. "I'm... Rather tired..."

Vita smirked. "You can't sleep yet, you still need to wake the others up and tell them the good news."

Shamal smiled tiredly. "Good point..."

It didn't take much to wake the others up, and the news caused more tears, but of genuine happiness.

"Can we see him?"

Shamal shook her head. "Not yet... I'm sorry, but he needs to rest." The look on their faces made Shamal chuckle. "You can visit him tomorrow."

"Thank you, Shamal. Thank you." Nanoha got up and hugged the doctor for all she was worth, Fate joining a moment later.

____________

_Beep..._

That was annoying.

_Beep..._

Yep, still annoying.

_Beep..._

Okay, that sound needed to die.

_Beep..._

Why did it feel like his body wanted nothing more than to fall apart right then and there?

_Beep..._

Had he over-did it with Vita in training again?

_Beep..._

No, she wouldn't put him in this much pain. What happened?

_Beep..._

Wait... he'd been on a mission, hadn't he?

_Beep..._

Yes, a mission. And something had gone wrong. He'd tried to protect the recruits...

_Beep..._

He'd been alone, without Arf or Vita, and he'd wanted to protect the kids. If he'd moved, they would have been killed.

_Beep..._

At least he got to say goodbye to Vita and Arf.

_Beep..._

Wait, he wasn't dead, was he?

_Beep..._

Not if it hurt that much to move.

_Beep..._

Where was he?

_Beep..._

How long was he out?

_Beep..._

And why the heck did he feel some hands running up and down on his arms softly?

_Beep..._

Okay, seriously. That noise needed to die.

Given a solid thought to latch onto, Yuuno groaned softly and tried to open his eyes. It took him several tries, ignoring pain, and he blinked groggily as his vision swam.

"Yuuno!" He heard voices from around him yell out happily, wasn't that a sign you were insane?

As his vision came into focus, he grinned lightly. "I am dead then."

Nanoha frowned at that. "Why?" Was the thought of seeing her again so horrible that he would rather be dead?

"Because the first thing I see are some beautiful angels to greet me."

On his other side, Fate gave a strangled laugh. "Yuuno, we'd have to be dead to greet you."

Yuuno frowned slightly at that; his brain was still lagging behind his body. "Wait... I'm not dead?"

Nanoha shook her head and squeezed his hand. "No... You aren't dead. You almost did die though." She sniffled, tears falling down her face again.

"Nanoha... Fate... How long...?"

Fate squeezed his arm gently. "You were out cold for the better part of a month. Vivio's shown up every day after school, hoping to see you awake."

Yuuno blinked and frowned, confused as, for a moment, he blanked out on why he was in the hospital bed in the first place. It hit him a moment later; holding up the shield, dropping it to regain his senses, seeing the shot coming straight at him and...

He laughed weakly. "I need to apologize to Vita," he mused. "I never even planned to get out of his way when I realized where he was firing."

"We know..." Nanoha smiled at him softly. "There was someone behind you. I'm just glad you're alive."

Yuuno smiled softly and squeezed her hand. "I'm sorry, Nanoha, Fate... I... I didn't mean to worry you two so much."

They shook their heads at him, smiling. "This sounds familiar." Fate smiled at him softly. "Almost like someone else who ended up here a long time ago."

"Fate-chan, you better not think of following our example and ending up here."

"It really doesn't feel good," Yuuno added helpfully, making Fate laugh softly. "I seriously thought I'd been killed..."

"Shamal said that she lost you once when bringing you in. She managed to bring you back. Yuuno-kun... Don't... Don't you ever worry us like that again!" Nanoha cried out, her eyes closing as tears fell down her face.

At that, Yuuno blinked. "I worried you?" He sounded incredibly surprised, or maybe that was brain damage speaking?

Nanoha nodded and Fate squeezed his hand gently. "Of course you did, you silly ferret." Yuuno got a small chuckle, before groaning as his chest didn't agree with the extra movement.

"Yuuno!" His lovers called out at the same time and he shook his head, panting lightly.

"Okay, no more making me laugh." Yuuno groaned out with a weak grin on his face.

Nanoha frowned worriedly. "Are you in pain? I can call someone..."

Even as Fate moved to stand, Yuuno shook his head weakly. "Don't bother," he murmured. "It's not something you can treat. The wound has to heal on its own."

"Yuuno..." Fate said softly and squeezed his hand. "We were just so worried, that's all."

"I'm sorry." He said, closing his eyes and taking a breath. "I just..."

The doors opened at that moment as a small girl walked in slowly. "Nanoha-mama... Fate-mama... Is Yuuno-papa still..." Vivio trailed off as Fate moved to the side, letting Yuuno wave tiredly at her. "Yuuno-papa!" She yelled excitedly and ran for the bed, stopping short of jumping on it when Fate grabbed her to stop her. "Mou... Fate-mama!"

"Now now, Vivio, Yuuno's in the hospital... Don't tackle him."

"You and Nanoha-mama do all the time." She pouted, getting a small chuckle from Yuuno.

"It's okay, Fate. Come here, Vivio." He smiled at her lightly as she crawled into his bed, hugging him.

"Are you going to come home soon?" Vivio immediately curled up by his side, snuggling as close as she possibly could without hurting him. "The house is really quiet without you."

"Oh?" Yuuno smiled tiredly.

"Uh huh. And Nanoha-mama and Fate-mama are sad."

"Vivio," Nanoha murmured softly.

"I'm sorry, Vivio. I didn't mean to make them sad."

She nodded hugging him tightly. "I missed you too."

Nanoha smiled sadly, the scene reminded her way too much of herself when her father was in the hospital. What Vivio was doing was something that she had wanted to do with her own father so long ago.

She just wished that she could have gone back in time and stopped what happened from happening.

Yuuno saw the look in his lovers' eyes and smiled slightly, gently rubbing Vivio's back. As worried as he was about them, he knew he couldn't just dismiss Vivio, either.

Fate nodded to Nanoha, who walked out of the room. "Vivio, Nanoha-mama and I are going to go see Shamal, okay? You keep Yuuno-papa company."

"Okay!" She called out happily. "Bai bai, mama."

Fate smiled as she walked out of the room. "Nanoha..." She said softly to the other woman, who was standing at the edge of the hallway. "Nanoha, it's okay, he's alive, Vivio didn't have to deal with the same neglect you did." She took Nanoha's hand with hers and rubbed Nanoha's palms with her thumbs. "He's alive, he's alive, Nanoha, he's in there right now talking to Vivio, giving her attention, he saved those people..." Nanoha wasn't reacting, at all, and Fate frowned. "Nanoha..."

The woman rocked back and forth, her hair casting shadows on her eyes and muttering something that Fate couldn't make out. "Nanoha!" She let go of Nanoha's hand and grabbed her shoulders, getting her lover to look at her in a shocked sort of wonderment.

"Fate-chan... What... I... I zoned out, didn't I?"

Seeing the tremor come into Nanoha's hands, Fate drew her female lover into her arms without hesitation. "What's wrong?" she asked softly. "It isn't like you to be spacing out like this."

Nanoha trembled and hugged Fate back tightly. "Just... I had a flashback... I... I saw my father and Miyuki..." She closed her eyes, trembling slightly.

"Nanoha?" Fate was worried for her.

"I... My mind flashed back to when I was a girl, my father was in the hospital... Hurting... Miyuki was with him. Mom and Kyoya were working... All alone... Couldn't bother them, needed to be strong for them so that they wouldn't worry."

"Nanoha..." Fate had gone beyond getting worried and was starting to get terrified.

"I... It hurts, Fate-chan." Nanoha trembled. "It hurts so much to be here."

"Nanoha..." Fate let go of the hug and grabbed Nanoha's arm. "Come on, let's walk." She smiled reassuringly.

"Fate...chan?"

"I want to know. I want to know why my Nanoha is hurting so much."

"But what about Yuuno-kun?"

"Vivio's keeping him company. He'll be fine, Nanoha. Shamal will call us if there's a major change."

On top of that, Fate had the sneaking suspicion that she, Nanoha, and Yuuno were going to have an interesting conversation once he was well enough, but for now that was in the future. Gently taking Nanoha's hand, she led the other woman outside.

"Fate-chan?" Nanoha muttered softly as Fate led her away from the hospital.

"You never told me why you hated to go to the hospital so much." She said softly as they walked away from the hospital doors.

"It... It's not something I want to bring up in casual conversation."

Fate made a show of looking around. "We seem to be alone now."

Nanoha smiled shakily and squeezed Fate's hand. "Can we sit down? It's kind of hard to explain."

Without hesitation Fate led Nanoha over to a nearby bench right across the street, draping an arm over the other woman's shoulders as they sat down and pulling her close.

"It..." Nanoha took a deep breath and leaned against Fate. "The doctors said that my dad came really close to death a few times. Mom only told me when I was in high school that dad actually had died a few times but was brought back to life." She closed her eyes and sighed deeply. "I... I never knew how bad it was..."

"Nanoha..." Fate said softly, rocking back and forth slowly, trying to soothe her.

"Remember... When I was in my coma, Fate-chan?"

"I could never forget." Fate said softly, closing her eyes, that was one of the worst moments in her life. At least the pictures she got of Nanoha and Hayate riding around on Zafira was always cute and funny sometimes.

"Did you know that the doctors had been discussing if I should be cut off from life support?" She asked, trembling slightly as she recalled that time in her life.

At that, Fate's eyes snapped open. "What?"

Her voice had gone low, deadly, in the blink of an eye. Her grip on Nanoha tightened slightly.

Nanoha laughed. "Nyhahaha... yeah. I guess they didn't think I could hear them. A few were really pushing for it... they thought it wasn't fair to keep me hooked up if I had no hope of recovering, but Mom and Dad fought them tooth and nail over it."

"I'm glad that they did." Fate said softly as she tried to fight back the sudden rush of anger that swelled up in her.

Nanoha nodded, that was the only thing that she could remember from that time, she had only regained enough consciousness at that point to hear that, before she relapsed. "You were there every day, I heard."

"Yes..." And the only reason that she had been allowed to do so was because Lindy had pulled enough strings to keep her away from doing anything, stating that her mental state would keep her from performing at her best.

Which was probably the truth.

"I'm glad." Nanoha smiled softly, before leaning up and kissing Fate on the lips. Smiling softly, the blond returned the kiss, pushing her tongue into Nanoha's mouth.

As nice as it felt to have Nanoha relax completely against her and return the kiss, Fate was still mindful of their surroundings, and pulled away after a few minutes.

Nanoha blinked, then pouted. "Mou, Fate-chan."

"We're in public," Fate reminded Nanoha lightly with a laugh.

"So?"

Fate laughed again; never say Nanoha didn't mind showing love when she felt like it. "Nanoha, we'd have to go home to take this further."

"Mmm... Fate-chan's soft and warm... I want some Fate-chan and if Fate-chan isn't given to me soon, I'll have to just go and get some Fate-chan on my own, and that would embarrass her." Nanoha warned with a small grin on her face.

Fate laughed and nodded. "Alright, alright, let's go home then. I'll give Lindy-mama a call to pick up Vivio tonight."

Nanoha smirked.

Fate sighed, even as she smiled.

"Late tonight," she amended.

(---)

Yuuno panted, something wasn't right. Why did he feel so tired all of a sudden?

"Papa? Papa?" Vivio's eyes widened as Yuuno got more and more pale, before slumping against the bed. "PAPA!" She screamed in fear.

At Vivio's screams, Shamal, who was in the hallway just coming to check on Yuuno, was in the room in a flash, Vita hot on her heels; one look at Yuuno had her paling. "Oh, hell," she whispered. She'd been so relieved, she'd forgotten the aftermath of the body trying to readjust its magical levels.

"Shamal?" Vita pulled Vivio into her arms. "What's going on?"

Shamal whirled around. "Get her out of here," she said tensely. "This isn't something she needs to see." Not waiting to see if Vita followed her order, she turned back to Yuuno and summoned all available medics.

"Auntie? Will papa be okay?" Vivio asked, whimpering as she was taken out of the room.

"Shamal's the best doctor here, Vivio. He'll be okay." She wasn't sure, she didn't know what was going on right now, and it was eating at her. "I think Yuuno just got worn out and Shamal's over-reacting." _You better just be over-reacting, Shamal._ She thought to herself.

Just as they exited the room, Amy came wandering in; maybe to visit, or to see what Fate and Nanoha were up to, Vita wasn't sure. In any case, the Knight was happy to see her.

"Aunt Amy!" With a wail, Vivio flew out Vita's arms and over to Amy.

"Whoa, hey there, kiddo." Amy easily swept the girl up into her arms. "What's going on? I thought you'd be in a good mood after seeing your papa!"

Vivio sniffled. "Something's wrong," she said softly. "Papa got really pale, and Aunt Shamal had to come in."

Amy blinked and looked at Vita, who shrugged helplessly.

"Where's Nanoha and Fate?"

"Nanoha-mama and Fate-mama said they were going to find Aunt Shamal, but they never came back." Vivio sniffled, causing Amy to look at Vita, who nodded and left to find a communication array.

"Maybe they went for a walk? You know that Nanoha doesn't like hospitals." That seemed to calm the little girl down as she nodded. "I'm sure that they'll be back soon, okay?"

"Mmn..." Vivio whimpered out softly, tears filling her eyes as she trembled.

Amy's eyes softened. Vivio wasn't her daughter, but she was a mother in every sense of the word.

"Hey, why don't you come over to my house and play with the twins? They've been asking for you. You can stay with me until Auntie Vita finds Nanoha-mama and Fate-mama."

Vivio sniffled. "What about Papa?" She asked helplessly.

Amy met the girl's gaze gently. "I promise I'll bring you back here if something changes, okay?"

Vivio nodded. "Okay."

The pair departed; after several minutes Vita returned to the area, muttering under her breath about busy signals and calls that couldn't be made because of stupid, stubborn Devices. She was jolted out of her reverie as Shamal came out of the room.

It was like the blonde didn't even see her; completely igonoring Vita, she walked calmly to a chair, turned, and dropped into it with a groan, dropping her face into her hands. "Dammit," she whispered. "_Dammit_. How the hell did I miss this?"

"Shamal?" Vita scrambled to her side. "What's wrong? What's going on?"

"I didn't even think of it, but now it explains why the wound healed so well even though his body wasn't stabilizing." Shamal closed her eyes, slowly. "Yuuno sustained damage to his Linker Core. His body never even stabilized itself; it's shutting down again."

"W...What?" Vita asked, her body gone stiff as her face drained of blood.

"He pushed himself too hard, Vita! I know that he doesn't push himself like Nanoha did when she was little, but he went to the edge and beyond. He tried so hard to keep going, just to return to them." Shamal groaned, her face twisted in a scowl of despair. "Right now, there are other doctors in there, who are better specialized than I am, trying to get his body to stabilize, to get his Linker Core from breaking down and shutting off."

"Wh...What did you mean by his wound healing so well even though his body never stabilized?" Vita had to know, she needed to know about these sort of things.

Shamal took a deep breath.

"Linker Cores channel the magic of any mage; that's a given. But healing magic is almost as old as time itself, and the most simple magic in existence; plenty of legends say that healing magic existed long before Linker Cores even developed." She rubbed her eyes. "For a defensive mage like Yuuno, healing his own body or others is as natural as breathing. He doesn't need a complete, functioning Linker Core to pull it off, he can do it just fine on his own."

Vita swallowed. "What does this have to do with damage to his Linker Core?"

Shamal sighed. "Linker Cores regulate the flow of magic in our bodies. If the Linker Core is damaged, the flow is thrown off and the body can't control the changing levels of magic."

"So, it's like..."

"A flamethrower without a safety valve. It's on, but there's no control at all, it just burns out uselessly."

Vita frowned, a single attack on an exhausted and weakened mage would be a way to do such a thing. "Will he be okay? Tell me the truth, Shamal."

Shamal sighed again.

"I don't know. The only one of us who ever came close to damaging her Linker Core was Nanoha-chan, and even to this day she still has some problems because of the injury she got." She closed her eyes. "All I have to say is, if Yuuno's Linker Core collapses, keeping him alive becomes much, much harder."

Vita paled.

"Bu...But you can stop this, right? Right? You and the other doctors." Vita had come to see Yuuno as a good, good friend since working with him, and he offered a lot of helpful information and tips for the rookies he worked with.

Shamal closed her eyes and shook her head. "I...I can't..." She slumped as she admitted that. "I don't have the skills or the abilities to do that." It was hard to admit that, even to one of her closest companions over the years.

"S..Shamal, but, you're so good at healing. There has to be a way?"

Shamal snapped her eyes up, getting a startled look from Vita. "Yes, I'm good at healing, battle injuries, some sicknesses, making sure people are healthy, I can do all that. Keeping someone alive because their Linker Core is screwing up? I can't do that. I couldn't help Hayate back then... I can't help Yuuno now." She finished, her voice very soft and weak.

Vita swallowed. "So... he's going to die?"

Shamal ran a tired hand through her hair. "He's out cold right now. His body is pushing itself, trying to repair his Linker Core. If it works, he should wake up, probably suffer a few lasting injuries like Nanoha-chan."

"And if it doesn't?"

"..."

"Shamal!"

Shamal closed her eyes. "He won't wake up," she said softly.

"..."

"All we can do is wait... And hope..." Shamal had, long ago, given up any notion that there was a higher power out there guiding and protecting people. Closing her eyes, she let out a small breath. _Just this once, please... If there is a higher power out there, please, let him make it through this._ It wasn't in her nature to believe it, but, considering that she also didn't believe that she would ever get a kind master, she had to give it a shot.

Vita groaned miserably and walked over to Shamal's side, sitting next to her. "Dammit," she whispered. "Of all the times for Nanoha and Fate to disappear, too..."

Shamal chuckled softly. "Let them enjoy themselves," she murmured. "Right now, nothing's going to change."

Vita stared at the floor.

"... Shamal... you really can't do anything for him?"

"If it was a normal injury, no matter how dangerous, I could help him. Believe me when I say that, Vita." Shamal grimaced. "But his Linker Core is what's damaged, and there's nothing I can do. If anything, my tampering with it would just make the situation worse."

"Just sit and wait?"

"That's all we can do."

Vita looked at the door and frowned softly. _Yuuno, you better get better._ She thought sadly.

(---)

Signum didn't have to look hard to find her fellow knight. "Hello, Vita." After all, seeing the raw destruction, the craters, the knocked over trees and the red aura of malice coming from the training grounds was a pretty big indicator of where Vita was.

"Signum."

"Still upset I see." Signum raised an eyebrow as Vita whirled on her, Graf Eisen in her hands.

In another time, Vita would have snapped at Signum; now she simply scowled and turned away. "Damn right I am," she muttered. "You might want to go away, or you'll be my next target."

Signum blinked.

"So you gave up on trying to contact Nanoha and Fate?"

"Tsk," Vita glared at an errant rock before smashing it with Graf Eisen, "their stupid devices are blocking all communication, I can't get through to them right now at all."

"I see..." Signum pulled out Laevantine, activated it, and took a stance.

"Signum?"

"You still need to vent, obviously, so I'm going to help you in that regard, Vita." Signum knew, even if Vita didn't, that sometimes the best way to express oneself was through battle.

Vita stared. "Signum, no. I could seriously hurt you right now."

Signum raised a brow.

"Your point?"

And in a blur of motion, she attacked.

"Guh!" Vita grimaced, she had forgotten how strong Signum was when she got going.

"What's the matter? You're too distracted by your anger and your emotions?" Signum pushed up, making Vita raise her arms up, only to kick the redheaded Knight away from her. "In battle, a warrior who lets their emotions cloud their judgment is as good as dead."

"I know that!" She yelled back and rushed forward, swinging Graf Eisen, now in its Rocket Hammer form, at Signum, who frowned slightly and flowed back with the attack. While she knew it was unfair, due to years of sparring with Vita, it just seemed like Vita was letting her anger make her predictable.

"Do you now?" Signum asked and lashed out with a slice, cutting off some of Vita's shirt and making her stumble backwards. "Because I just scored a hit on you that would have killed you if I was trying."

"SHUT UP!" Vita screamed and rushed forward again, ignoring the tear in her shirt, which revealed her under-shirt, as she connected blow after blow against Signum, or tried to at any rate as the pink-haired boob monster seemed to flow between attacks, blocking those she couldn't dodge and launching counter-attacks, leaving Vita a bit cut up, her shirt and pants in tatters and the smaller knight breathless.

Signum paused, raising a brow.

"Honestly, Vita, the old you would have killed me in five minutes. This is just pathetic."

"SHUT UP!!!"

In a blur of red Vita attacked; she was easy enough to block, but her anger was making her faster even if her blows weren't strong enough to do serious damage to Signum.

"YOU WEREN'T THERE!" she screamed, tears streaming down her face. "YOU DIDN'T SEE WHAT HAPPENED, YOU DIDN'T SEE HIM!! I WAS SUPPOSED TO PROTECT HIM! I PROMISED I'D PROTECT HIM!!"

At that, she collapsed into helpless sobs. "I promised," she choked out. "I promised Nanoha I'd protect him in battle."

Signum waited, and waited, but when it became apparent that Vita wasn't going to attack anymore, she sighed and recalled Laevantine to its necklace state. "And you failed."

"SHUT UP!" She yelled at Signum, more tears falling down her face. "I failed, as a knight, as a friend, as a guardian! I keep... I KEEP FAILING!" She pounded the ground a few times, her hands starting to get bloody as her skin broke.

Signum watched, her face set still, before she finally had enough, knelt down next to Vita and grabbed her hand before she did any more damage to herself. "Listen to me, and listen well, Vita. Yes, he's hurting, and yes, you couldn't keep your promise to Nanoha." It had taken all of her self control to not call Nanoha "that thing" this time. "But you still did your job by protecting the younger recruits, keeping them alive is one of the jobs a Knight of Belka has, after all."

"But I promised," Vita choked out. "That was the only reason Nanoha even let him go in the first place, because I said I'd protect him." She squeezed her eyes shut against tears that wouldn't stop falling. "And I didn't."

Signum nodded and helped her stand up. "Vita, I cannot say that what you did was the right thing. But if you had abandoned your post to make sure that Yuuno had been alright and left the recruits by themselves, then you would have been in the wrong.

"But, I..."

Signum held up a hand to stop any more protests. "Vita, regardless if it was smarter to go into different groups or stick together, you chose the correct course of action afterwords. It doesn't make it any easier, I know, but sometimes, commanders need to make those hard decisions and hope for the best.

Vita lowered her eyes. "Tell that to Nanoha and Fate..."

"Vita, I guarantee you that if you had told them that you let some rookies die just to save Yuuno they would never forgive you."

"Signum..."

The pink haired knight shook her head. "Even if they would go to hell and back just to save one person's life, they would first make sure that they could save as many as possible. Remember that, Vita."

"I..."

Signum sighed and stood up. "Let's get your hands cleaned up." She said as she picked up Graf Eisen.

"Signum..."

"Vita?"

"If... If that was Hayate instead of Yuuno, would you be talking like this to me right now? Or would you be beating me for failing our master?"

"No."

Signum's simple answer had Vita looking at her, eyes wide. "What?" she squeaked.

"I said no," the pink-haired Knight replied calmly. "I'd be upset, yes, and sad, but I'd know that you tried your best to protect her." She smiled sadly. "That's all we can ever hope to do, Vita. Anything else is out of our hands."

Vita was silent as they went inside to get her hands cleaned up. "Never makes it easier."

"Nope."

"...Thank you, Signum."

* * *

At this point, the story diverges into two different paths. Two endings. One bad, one good.

The only thing I ask, is if you read this, read both endings.


	2. Ending A

RadiantBeam and myself do not own these characters.

What If Yuuno didn't survive?

* * *

Ending A:

Signum simply chuckled, smiling slightly.

The smile on her face faded as Shamal came out onto the training grounds. "Shamal? What's wrong?"

Shamal just shook her head helplessly before tackling Vita, hugging her tightly as she collapsed into deep, body-shaking sobs.

Vita's eyes widened. "No," she whispered hoarsely. "Shamal, no."

"He passed away in his sleep. We tried, we tried so hard to save him. But, we couldn't. We couldn't stop it." She sobbed out, trembling. "His body just... Just gave out on us."

Something seemed to go out in Vita's eyes. "He's dead," she said weakly.

"He just... it was so quick." The tears wouldn't stop falling. "He stopped breathing, his heart stopped, it was over before we could do anything."

Wordlessly, Signum undid her transformation and stalked out of the arena. She summoned a contact screen within a few moments, nearly snarling with frustration when Raising Heart blocked the communication. "Dammit, let me through," she snapped. "This is important."

"My master has stated that no calls shall be passed through unless they are absolutely impossible to ignore." The device said to her calmly.

"Here's a call for you." Signum resisted the urge to punch the innocent screen. "Yuuno Scrya is dead. Get your damn master and give her a wake-up call, or I'll find them both myself!"

Raising Heart was silent before the screen flashed, indicating that Signum would get audio only. "Signum", Nanoha's voice was tired as she heard it, "what's going on? Raising Heart said it was important."

"Takamachi... Yuuno Scrya just passed away." She said, waiting for a response. She didn't need to wait long.

"Signum, if this is a joke..."

"It is no joke. Wherever you and Testarossa are at, get back to the hospital, right now." She said, closing her eyes and sighing. "Shamal will give you all the details."

Signum didn't even wait for the screen to close as she exited the area, once again heading out to the training grounds. Vita was on the ground, looking as she'd been hit by a car, only to have that car go into reverse and hit her again.

Shamal, for her part, was still crying quietly. Wordlessly, Signum ran a hand through Vita's hair before she knelt beside Shamal, gently lifting the blond into her arms. "Come on." Her voice was soft, almost gentle. "Takamachi and Testarossa will be here any minute."

Vita nodded and mechanically walked into the hospital. "What... Vivio... What... How can I tell her that it's my fault that her papa died?" She asked, her voice incredibly weak. She still couldn't believe it. She felt like she was dreaming.

Signum said nothing, simply sighed. She wasn't looking forward to dealing with Fate or Nanoha about this.

After a minute, Shamal squirmed slightly. "I can walk."

"Shamal..."

"I have to tell them." Shamal's voice was dull. "I'm the one who has to say he died. I can walk, Signum."

Quietly, Signum lowered Shamal to the ground and let her lead the way.

"How can you be so strong?" Vita asked Signum, who shrugged and sighed.

"I'm not strong." Signum said softly. "I just have a hard time feeling any emotions sometimes."

"... That's worse, isn't it?"

"Yes. Yes, it is."

Shamal sighed. "They're here already," she murmured.

Vita knew she was talking about Nanoha and Fate.

The looks on their faces... It took everything that Vita and Shamal had in them to not break down crying right then and there.

"Shamal, please... Please, oh PLEASE tell us that Signum was just joking to get us to come back to the hospital and that Yuuno's not dead." Fate said, as she was the only one coherent enough to speak between the two of them. From the speed that the two had gotten there, it was obvious that they had sped the whole way there.

The looks on Vita and Shamal's faces was more than enough to answer the question. Fate went stiff, her face pale as Nanoha collapsed to the ground, bawling, Vita at her side a moment later to keep her from hurting herself and her babies.

"How?" Fate asked, trembling and if Signum hadn't grabbed her, she might have followed Nanoha's example and collapsed to the ground.

There was no point in lying, not now. It wouldn't change anything in the long run. Shamal took a deep breath and straightened up slightly.

"We missed it," she said softly. "He sustained damage to his Linker Core. He never even fully recovered because his body couldn't stabilize itself." She closed her eyes. "He relapsed not long after you two left. It happened so fast... he just died." She blew out a long, ragged breath. "He never even opened his eyes. He just closed them and never opened them again because he stopped breathing, his heart stopped functioning."

Signum was the only reason that Fate didn't collapse right then and there as the pink-haired woman held her tight, pulling her into a hug, rocking back and forth softly as Shamal stood there, trembling in sadness. For all her battle abilities, this was one thing that she couldn't fight off.

The best she could do was to make sure that both Nanoha and Fate didn't try anything stupid.

After a moment, Shamal cleared her throat.

"We haven't moved him yet," she said quietly. "If you two want to say anything in private or... he's still there."

Fate nodded and Vita helped Nanoha to her feet, both walked slowly to the room, Signum and Vita there with them each step of the way to keep them from hurting themselves or anyone else.

Shamal followed after a bit, giving them some distance. Right now, she wanted to find a bottle of alcohol and drink herself stupid. It wouldn't help, she knew, but she needed to do something to get rid of the pain she felt in herself.

Shamal paused when Signum and Vita came out of the room. "Is it all right to...?"

Signum nodded. "They won't do anything," she murmured. "They need to be alone right now."

Vita scowled, but Shamal could see the pain in her eyes. "Hey, Shamal, you know a good place to get drunk? I could really, really use it right now." She closed her eyes, only to see the broken, shattered look on Fate and Nanoha's faces.

_"Dammit..."_

Shamal sighed and just left the area, Signum and Vita following. They didn't know if she was going to get drunk or just take a walk. They just didn't want to be in the area right at that moment.

(---)

Fate looked at Yuuno, he looked so peaceful, so quiet, like he was going to wake up any moment now and tell them that they shouldn't worry. "Yuuno..." It couldn't be true, it just couldn't be.

Nanoha was the first to move, timidly stepping to Yuuno's side as if she expected him to wake up and look at her at any moment, as if any small movement she made could jolt him into wakefulness.

It didn't.

"Yuuno-kun?" Still timid, Nanoha reached out and gently brushed his cheek, biting down hard on her lip.

It didn't feel right. He still felt so warm beneath her fingers; he still felt so _alive_; weren't the dead supposed to feel cold to the touch?

"Come on, please, Yuuno-kun... You're still alive, right? Right?" Nanoha asked, her eyes tearing up as she trembled. "You can't be dead, you're still warm. You... You promised us you would be alright, you promised us! What about Vivio? Or your babies, don't leave them alone!" She bawled out, losing it and putting her head on his chest, crying.

She hated feeling like this, and she had done more crying since Yuuno had gotten hurt than ever in her life.

Even as she wept, she knew, deep down, that he was dead; she couldn't feel his heartbeat, couldn't hear it gently pounding the way it always had in the past.

Fate still hung back. Part of her wanted to give Nanoha the time, the space she needed to grieve for Yuuno, but another part of her was still in denial; she believed, somehow, that if she didn't move to Yuuno, didn't see him up close or touch him, she could believe this was all a bad dream, and Yuuno would still be alive when she woke up.

She put her hand over her belly, it wasn't right, it just wasn't. He had to be alive, he had to be!

Time ticked on, Nanoha hadn't stopped grieving as she lay on top of Yuuno and Fate, after a long time, had walked forward, tears falling down her face that picked up and started to fall faster and faster as she got closer and closer. In the end, she had given up any control she had as she sobbed while standing over Yuuno's body. She still couldn't bring herself to touch the body, but she hurt, a lot, over it.

Sniffling, wiping at her eyes, Nanoha stepped back slightly from Yuuno and gently took Fate's hand. She gave it a quick, hard squeeze before she rested Fate's palm against Yuuno's chest, over the silent place where his heart had been.

Fate's eyes widened. She didn't feel anything beneath her palm; even though Yuuno's skin was warm to the touch, his heart was silent.

"Fate-chan." Nanoha sounded so helpless, so pained, even as she collapsed into sobs again.

"N...Nanoha!" Fate walked around Yuuno and pulled the grieving woman into her arms, holding her.

"Fate-chan..." Nanoha cried into Fate's chest, her body trembling as she was held. She didn't notice as Fate cried silent tears that splattered into her hair. She didn't notice it, all she knew was that Fate was there, and Yuuno... He would never be there for her again.

"It isn't right." Nanoha was babbling now, talking without even knowing what she was saying as Fate held her tightly, still crying. "He... dead people are supposed to feel cold, and he still feels so warm, Fate-chan! Yuuno-kun doesn't feel like he's dead!"

Fate had her eyes closed as she shook her head slowly. "He... He does still feel alive, he shouldn't be dead, I know."

"Why? Why is he dead? He should still be alive! He's a father, he's going to have babies soon, he shouldn't be dead!"

Fate had nothing to say to that as Nanoha cried out her sadness and anguish. Fate was hurting too, but she knew that Nanoha needed to vent.

Maybe Fate was setting herself up for worse pain in the future, she knew she should be venting like Nanoha was, but, she also knew that Nanoha needed someone strong for her right then and there.

If Yuuno had been there, it would have been easy enough; the two of them could have given Nanoha all the support and love she needed, while also having the freedom to let out their own emotions from time to time.

But Yuuno wasn't there, not anymore; not the way he'd always been there. He was dead, and nothing could change it. No one was strong enough to bring back the dead.

_No one..._

Fate laughed hollowly. "I think I understand it now," she whispered hoarsely. "I think I understand why Mother became so obsessed with bringing Onee-chan back to life."

Nanoha looked up at her, blinking away her tears. "Fate-chan?"

"It's so easy to see." Fate said softly, her eyes closed as tears silently fell down her face. "It hurts... It hurts so much to lose someone you love deeply that you would do anything to bring them back, anything at all. Even become a monster to do it." She trailed off, remembering the whippings that she had gotten at the hands of that woman. It hurt a lot at the time, it hurt more because she didn't realize why she had been getting whipped, she just thought she had deserved it.

Now though? She had a perfect understanding into Precia's mind-set. It... It was scary.

"Fate-chan." Nanoha pressed closer to her female lover, trying to wipe away her tears even though she herself was still crying. "Don't. You know Yuuno-kun would never..." She swallowed hard. "It wouldn't be him, not completely. Even if there was a way, we could never... we'd never to totally bring him back."

Chrono had said that, hadn't he? You could lose something, and even if you got it back, it was never the same as it had been before you lost it.

"I know that. I _know_ that, but..." Fate buried her face into Nanoha's hair, trembling. She'd still thought about it, though. The moment she'd seen Yuuno, the moment she'd touched him and known he was dead, her mind had flashed back to every detail Precia had studied to bring Alicia back to life.

"I know, Fate-chan, I know." Nanoha sniffled and held onto Fate tightly, the two of them grieving, for Yuuno, for each other, for their children who would never have a father.

It hurt so much for them.

It would be hours before anyone came to check up on them.

Walking into the room, Hayate, dressed in her brown military uniform, sighed sadly as she looked at the scene, Nanoha and Fate were passed out against the wall, seemingly unwilling to leave Yuuno, at all. She walked up to them and looked closely, just to be sure.

She sighed as she saw them both take a breath in their sleep.

"Hayate..." Rein said softly as she and Agito floated into the room. "Are they?"

"They're alive, I... I don't know if they will be okay at all though." She said softly, her shoulders slumped.

Rein cautiously drifted closer to the pair, gently reaching out to touch Nanoha's hair; the Ace barely even stirred at her touch.

"There has to be _something_ we can do," Agito said, hating the helplessness she felt.

Hayate shrugged tiredly. "We can give Yuuno a funeral. I could arrange counseling, sic them on the superiors if I really wanted to see some bloodshed." She shook her head. "But I can't do the thing they want most. I can't bring back the dead."

There was what Scagiletti had done to Zest, but Hayate wasn't going to do that, since Zest's body had broken down eventually and stopped working anyway, Hayate wasn't going to go that route at all.

"But, Meister..."

"Agito, please... It's hard enough..." Hayate sighed and walked over to Yuuno, before closing her eyes and pulling the sheet over his face, covering him. "It... It feels like I just... Just closed off the door." She sighed, slumping. It was times like these that she wished she had someone to hold her right now. She could use some support.

"But, Meister, Zest was..."

Hayate smiled tiredly.

"Agito, I know you loved him. But what Zest was... he wasn't living, not really. He was going to break down eventually and die again, and he knew that. How could I do that to Yuuno-kun? How could I give Nanoha-chan and Fate-chan that hope, only for him to break down again a few years later?"

No one could be claimed from death. Precia had tried it, and it had driven her mad; Zest had eventually died again. Once a person died, they were dead.

Nothing could bring them back.

Despite herself, though, Hayate still felt half tempted to sic Fate and Nanoha on the higher-ups.

Agito slumped and floated slowly to the floor. "Yeah..." She knew that, it would be cruel, she recalled how much it hurt to see Zest die in front of her when Signum killed him, and how much he was suffering before-hand. "rrrrgh... Meister! Can I take Signum and lay waste to the idiots who caused all this?" Whether she was talking about the jerk who hurt Yuuno or the higher ups, Hayate wasn't sure, but still...

"I'm sorry, Agito, no... You can't."

"Agito..." Rein hugged the other Unison Device from behind and held her. "Please... You don't want to get Hayate in trouble."

Agito sighed as Rein held her, she might have had a bit of a rivalry with Rein, but the other Unison Device was a good person.

Hayate smiled slightly.

"Thank you, Rein." She looked back to Yuuno's body and narrowed her eyes. "But I could care less about myself right now. Heads _will_ roll when I'm done with the higher-ups."

Agito's eyes widened even as Rein gasped. "Meister?"

"I'm going after them." Hayate chuckled. "I doubt I'll be the only one."

"Meister?"

Hayate shook her head. "Come on, we have to get certain things taken care of first..." The two nodded and floated after her silently as she left the room.

"Meister?"

"Agito, I won't lie, someone's going to pay for this, I'm going to find out just what the hell is going on around here. The incident with Scagiletti could have been avoided if there wasn't so many skeletons in the closet between the higher end TSAB members."

Rein hesitated. "Hayate..."

"Yes?"

"What about Nanoha and Fate?"

Hayate looked back at her friends; her eyes softened even as her heart ached. "Leave them," she murmured. "They need more time."

Rein nodded and floated next to Agito. "Agito..."

"Yeah?"

"What can we do?"

The redhead sighed and her shoulders slumped. "For all of our power, there's nothing we can do to reverse or stop the flow of time..." There were times when she felt really, really helpless, and she hated that. "Rein?" She blinked as Rein hugged her.

"I know, but Agito shouldn't be so sad... It hurts when I see you hurting."

In another place, Agito would have teased Rein, mercilessly, for what she'd just said. Now, she simply accepted Rein's hug and awkwardly put an arm around her shoulders. "Thanks, Rein," she murmured.

It wasn't much; not really.

But it was enough.

Hayate smiled slightly, at least some good was coming out of this, still... She had to talk to Chrono about funeral services, and maybe she needed to talk to Carim as well.

Hayate stopped walking in the hallway, causing Rein and Agito to blink for a moment. She hesitated only briefly before she walked back into the room and knelt down beside Fate and Nanoha, giving them a gentle shake. "Nanoha-chan, Fate-chan," she said softly. "Come on, wake up. I need to talk to you."

"Nnngh... Hayate-chan?" Nanoha blinked, her face looked horrible, blood-shot eyes with tear-tracks down her beautiful face caused Hayate's heart to clench in pain. Seeing Fate in a similar state nearly caused her to start crying herself.

"I'm here, Nanoha-chan... I... I need to talk to both of you." She said softly as she cupped their cheeks softly, rubbing them gently.

For a moment, Nanoha seemed to have forgotten where she was or why she was there in the first place; as the sleepiness faded from her eyes, clarity came to her.

Fate, for her part, remembered everything much faster and simply buried her face into Nanoha's shoulder. "What about?"

Hayate hesitated, bit her bottom lip.

"We... I need to make funeral arrangements," she whispered to them softly.

Nanoha nodded stiffly and swallowed slightly. "H...Hayate-chan." The pain was evident and Hayate felt her heart clench tightly.

_Funeral plans can wait._ Hayate thought before grabbing Nanoha and Fate and hugging them both, letting them grab onto her and hold her tightly. "Nanoha-chan, Fate-chan... I'm so, so sorry." She said softly to them.

Hayate had seen Fate and Nanoha when they'd first come in, and she'd believed they couldn't cry anymore than they already had. She was proven soundly wrong as she felt them tremble in her arms.

"Meister." Agito's voice was soft, unusually timid; Hayate tilted her head slightly to look at the red-haired Unison Device, and saw she still had an arm along Rein's shoulders. "You got a call from the higher-ups..."

"What about it, Agito?"

Agito and Rein exchanged nervous looks. "It's Yuuno-kun," Rein said softly. "They... they want to... look at him." She faltered. "They want to study a damaged Linker Core to... to understand its effects on mages."

Hayate twitched, she could feel Nanoha and Fate stiffen in her arms. _This is too much._ She frowned, granted it would be a great way to figure out how to help people in the future, but it was too soon.

She understood, and she didn't want such a problem in the future, but it was too _soon_.

Sighing, Hayate took a deep breath. "Tell the higher ups that I will get back to them."

"They said that they were on their way."

_Okay, I'm going to hurt them now._ Hayate twitched, if it wasn't for Nanoha and Fate holding her tightly, she would have unisoned with Rein and gone outside to lay some hurt down on those idiots.

For a brief moment, Agito wondered if she could go find Signum; but Rein was leaning against her, and there was one more piece of information she needed to share with Hayate. "Meister?"

Hayate sighed. "They said more?"

"Yes." Agito straightened up, feeling the rage burn at her even as she hated what she was about to say, knowing how it would hurt the women in Hayate's arms. "They said they won't take no for an answer. They said if you don't hand the..." Here, she had to choke back her fury. "If you don't hand the defensive mage over, they'll take him by force."

At that, Hayate stiffened.

"Defensive mage?" Nanoha asked weakly.

"They aren't even calling him by name," Rein whispered. "It's horrible. I heard some of them muttering in the background while Agito was talking to them. They never called him by his name, not even once. They said things like 'defensive mage', 'damaged goods', 'specimen'. No one's calling him Yuuno."

Hayate frowned heavily, _Signum! Vita! Shamal! Zafira! I don't care if you four are having sex, drunk, stoned or asleep, get to my location **now!**_ She commanded, using her link with the Wolkenritter to talk to them over a distance and get them to move. "Nanoha-chan, Fate-chan..." She said softly, trying to get them to calm down. She didn't want them to hurt themselves or the babies by trying to knock some sense into the people on their way.

Rein and Agito echanged looks. They both knew when Hayate needed a private moment with her two best friends to try and calm them down.

"I'll go look for Signum," Agito decided, releasing Rein. "She feels close by."

"I'll find Vita." Rein nodded resolutely. "She's close, too."

With that, the two tiny Unison Devices departed.

"They... Can't... Even... Give... Yuuno-kun... His proper respect?!" Nanoha's eyes were practically glowing as she said each word through gritted teeth. "I... Can... NOT... BELIEVE THIS!"

Hayate knew she was stronger, knew that her friend needed to calm down, knew that Raising Heart and Bardiche wouldn't let Nanoha or Fate risk injury, not right now.

However, she also knew that Nanoha was a pregnant woman who had just lost the father of her children and was still grieving.

Fate was a lot quieter, but there was a glint in her eyes that made Hayate gulp despite of herself.

Hayate never cursed the original Reinforce, it wasn't her fault that she had become the way she did.

She just wished that she had been given access to spells that didn't have a long start-up time. Great for area bombardment, not-so great when trying to deal with two very upset and emotional friends.

"Nanoha-chan, Fate-chan." Knowing her spells wouldn't work, Hayate resorted to words to keep her friends at bay. "Think of the babies. You go after them now, you risk hurting your kids."

"They aren't even calling Yuuno-kun by _name_, Hayate-chan!" Nanoha was worked into a fury that even the devils would fear. "They just see him as... as... they don't see him as a human being!!"

Fate was still silent; she still had that deadly flare in her eyes. Hayate was worried for both of her friends, but Fate's tranquil fury scared her more.

"Look at me. Dammit, both of you look at me." She forced them to meet her gaze. "I know how you feel. I don't know how much it hurts," she admitted, "because I never loved Yuuno, not the way you two did. But I can understand your anger."

Fate finally spoke up. "Hayate--"

"He was my friend too." Hayate swallowed hard. "He was my friend too, and dammit, I could have done more to keep him out of this. I have to live with that for the rest of my life."

"It's not..."

"I know." Hayate interrupted Nanoha, squeezing her shoulder tightly. "I know. I know it's not the same, that I can never hurt as much as you two do right now, that no matter what, you two are going to have a hole in your hearts due to this. I know all that." She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "But it still hurts, it hurts so much that right now I want to throw up, scream, blow something up and stab out my own heart, just to stop the pain from coming. Please, please you two, don't do what you're thinking of doing."

Opening her eyes, Hayate could see Nanoha's fury had cooled; not by any small degree, but enough that she wouldn't be tempted to aim a Starlight Breaker at anyone when she wasn't in the condition to handle it. Breathing a quiet sigh of relief, Hayate glanced at Fate.

She froze.

Fate didn't look calm. Her anger, it seemed, hadn't cooled in the least. The glare in her eyes promised death to anyone or anything that was unlucky enough to get in her way. For a moment, just an instant, Hayate could see a staggering resemblance to the woman who had created Fate.

Nanoha gently touched Fate's shoulder. "Fate-chan?"

Fate took a deep breath, hopefully to collect her thoughts, Hayate wasn't sure, before she spoke again. "Hayate... Make sure that those people understand our... Displeasure," she emphasized displeasure in such a way that Hayate was probably going to be forced to use a Starlight Breaker herself to prove a point soon, "to the people coming in."

Hayate could still see the anger burning in Fate's eyes, she understood perfectly, herself, why Fate was so angry, it still unnerved her. "Fate-chan..." Hayate and Nanoha said softly at the same time, both grabbing and hugging her tightly.

Hayate mentally scowled. Heads were going to roll for this, for making her two beautiful friends suffer, for Yuuno's death, people were going to pay.

It wasn't long before a trio of men, all dressed in suits, walked into the room. "Take him." The man in the white coat said, before blinking as a short brown-haired female stood in his way. "General, I'm sorry, but we need to examine the corpse."

Narrowing her eyes, Hayate wondered what was taking the Wolkenritter so long, but that didn't matter as she held up her book and cross. "You have exactly five seconds to turn around and leave before I do something that you're going to regret." It helped that Nanoha and Fate were behind her a moment later, both of them glaring at the trio.

"I see we have no choice, restrain them." The two men took a step forward, only to be stopped as they felt several white spikes press into various points on their body.

"Sorry for being so late, Mistress." Zafira, in wolf form, said as he, Signum, Vita and Shamal stood at the door, Rein and Agito floating nearby. "There were several people trying to get in our way."

Hayate nodded and in a flash was in her knight outfit, pointing her staff at the man in charge. "Listen and listen well, you will not touch Yuuno Scrya's body until you have **_my_** clearance to do so. I do **_not_** care about what your bosses or my bosses have to say on the matter, you _**will**_ leave here, you will be peaceful about it, and you will not bother us again. Do you understand?" She asked, her eyes narrowing and promising pain to the trio in front of her.

"You know that they aren't going to be happy about this." The one in charge said bitterly to her.

Hayate smirked at him. "They can try, they can try."

"Very well, general, we'll take our leave for now." He looked at Nanoha and Fate and shook his head. "I can not guarantee anything." With that, he walked out of the room, the other two following him, limping and bleeding slightly.

Sighing heavily, Hayate changed back into her usual clothing with a groan. "I think that really, really pissed them off," she mused.

Vita was scowling; any grief she still felt was currently on the back-burner. "What the hell's going on?" she demanded. "We go your orders to come, and nearly got bull-dozed by several of those suits along the way."

Hayate sighed again. She wondered how she'd possibly keep Nanoha and Fate at bay when the superiors came back.

"Long story short, our dear higher-ups are looking at Yuuno like a fly caught in a spider's web. They want to use this... opportunity to study a damaged Linker Core and its effects on the body."

After a moment, Signum cleared her throat. "I understand what's going on," she said carefully, "but what exactly is the conflict? Yuuno..." Here, she paused. "Yuuno would have supported such a thing. You know how he was."

At that, Agito grimaced. "Yeah, well, you'd have been damn pissed off if you heard how they were talking about them," she muttered.

Rein nodded in agreement. "It was horrible," she whispered. "Some of them... some of the younger ones were even saying it was _good_ that he died because he..." She glanced at Nanoha and Fate nervously, inching closer to Agito. "Because he served his... initial purpose."

In the silence that followed this statement, you could have heard a pin drop.

Hayate rubbed her forehead, she knew Yuuno would have supported it, but she knew that Nanoha and Fate needed to have a funeral for him. "Nanoha, Fate." She said sternly as she turned to look at them, getting them to stop and look at her in surprise. "I will deal with them. I don't want you two to do something stupid right now."

"Hayate..." They both murmured, sometimes it was easy to forget that their friend was one of the highest ranking officers around.

She sighed and shook her head. "If I let you two go out there and vent, I would fail as your best friend." She smirked at them softly. "You'll get your chance to tell them off soon enough, I promise you that."

"How soon?" The anger had dulled before, but it came back to burn brightly in Nanoha's eyes. As for Fate, well... Hayate doubted her fury had cooled at all.

"As soon as I clear up this mess." Hayate turned away. "The two of you stay here. I want Signum and Vita with you, in case those men come back. Agito, Rein, you two come with me and tell me all about this... interesting discussion you heard. Zafira, Shamal, you two double check what's going on around here." They both nodded and left in a hurry.

Agito and Rein both nodded and followed Hayate out into the hallway as she walked towards the door, her eyes scanning for anyone else who might be a problem.

"Talk." The tone brokered no argument, no counter, just a plain demand on what she wanted to know.

"The men in the white coats," scientists, Hayate bitterly noted, they really needed better attitudes, "were saying that with him dead, it was the perfect chance to study the corpse and study how Linker Cores react when damaged and strained." Rein said, she could feel the anger starting to roll off of Hayate.

"The one said that it was a good thing it was someone so unimportant that died. If it had been one of the aces, then the Bureau would be in trouble." Agito added, frowning as she recalled it. Actually, that guy gave her some bad vibes... Really bad vibes... "Um, Meister..."

"Agito?" Hayate blinked as Agito floated in front of her, her head down-cast and covering her eyes.

"I think... I think that one of those men... I think I saw him before."

Hayate stopped, Agito hardly ever talked about anything from before she was with Zest and Lutecia. "What?" Rein floated next to her master, looking concerned.

"I... I think that one of those guys was one of the people who did experiments on me when I was captured."

Hayate blinked.

Just blinked.

"Agito, are you sure?"

"Not totally." The red-haired Device fidgeted uncomfortably in the air. "I mean, I didn't really get a good look at him, and all those scientists wear the same clothes."

"Then what made you think it was him?"

"His voice. Something in his voice, the way he was talking." Agito shuddered. "It sounded really, really familiar."

"Familiar, how?" Rein asked, a nervous look on her face.

"The way he spoke to the others, the uncaring tone, the way he seemed to get gleeful when the word experiment would come up... And the accent... I swear, he sounded exactly the same as the guy who put needles in me and caused me nothing but pain, Meister!" Tears started falling down her face unnoticed by Agito. "I'm not lying! I don't like scientists but I don't lie about the people that hurt me!"

Rein immediately hugged Agito, not sure what was wrong but wanting to help anyway she could. Hayate, for her part, needed no further convincing. Something that could make Agito this agitated held some weight to it, if any at all.

"Wouldn't surprise me," she murmured. "They were all licensed by a few of the older members. Someone could have pulled some strings to keep him safe when you were rescued."

Agito didn't even react to Rein's hug, she was trembling slightly as she recalled the pain she went through, of the constant prodding, needling, and the heartless comments that was thrown her way. She blinked as she felt Hayate's hand on her head, rubbing her softly. "Meister?"

Hayate smiled softly to her. "Agito, they won't hurt you again. They can never touch you again. You're a part of my family now, I don't let my family get hurt."

Agito nodded, tears of happiness slowly falling down her face. It was only then that she finally reacted to Rein's hugging and hugged the other unison device back. "Thank you, Meister, Rein."

Hayate shook her head. "You're family, Agito, and I always look out for my family."

Hayate frowned, lowering her hand from Agito's head. On more important matters, why would someone like that be interested in Yuuno? Unless he'd been re-assigned to another team after the incident with Agito...

She sighed.

"Hell, I'm half tempted to just sic Fate-chan and Nanoha-chan on the whole team. That'd make things a lot simpler."

"But, Hayate-chan, wouldn't that put the babies at risk?" Rein asked, frowning in confusion.

"Which is the only thing keeping me from siccing Nanoha and Fate on them." Hayate sighed and took one last look around the area, before shaking her head.

After a moment, Hayate turned away. "Come on," she said. "We have to get back."

"What about those men?" Rein asked in confusion, before she looked around, not seeing anyone.

"If they wanted to get Yuuno, they would have met me by now. They aren't coming back." Hayate closed her eyes slowly. "Come on," she repeated softly. "There's nothing more we can do."

The two nodded and followed Hayate back.

A few days later, Yuuno's funeral was held. It was surprisingly larger than even Hayate would have imagined, but for that, she was kind of thankful. At least Yuuno had a lot of people that showed up either out of respect or because they had actually liked him in life.

Hayate held onto Vivio, letting the little girl cry, she hadn't stopped crying since she found out that her Yuuno-papa would never be getting better or coming back ever again. Fate was being held by her mother and Nanoha was clinging to her sister tightly, she sighed heavily. _I should have fought harder to keep Yuuno off the front lines._ She thought to herself bitterly.

"You musn't blame yourself." Signum's voice was low, soft; Zafira brushed by her legs, and Vivio immediately latched onto him. "You couldn't have known this would happen."

Hayate smiled bitterly. "Try telling that to everyone else," she murmured.

Signum quietly studied them both; Fate was cradled in Lindy's arms like she was a child again, the older woman whispering to her softly, while Nanoha clung to Miyuki, her dark-haired sister quietly stroking her hair and looking ahead at nothing. "Where are Nanoha's parents?"

"They got called back to Earth about the shop. It happened before Yuuno died, and they couldn't make it back." Hayate sighed. "It's been hard..."

Signum nodded, before she put an arm around Hayate, getting the brown-haired woman to hug her tightly and press her face against the pink-haired woman's chest, shuddering as she finally let go, her emotions leaking out as she cried softly.

Sighing softly, Signum stroked Hayate's back. Her master hadn't even allowed herself to cry in the past few days. Dealing with the scientists and other idiots bothering her over Yuuno's death and wanting to use him as a research subject had taken a lot out of her.

They all looked like hell, Signum mused with a sigh. Lindy, clearly, was reliving the loss of her own husband even as she tried her best to soothe Fate; her eyes were tired, weary, and so saddened that it broke the knight's heart neatly in two.

Miyuki wasn't faring much better; she hadn't been sleeping or eating well, spending most of her time with Nanoha, and the strain showed. Still, the girl had earned Signum's respect after she'd chased off one of those grubby scientists with nothing more than a wooden practice sword.

As for Nanoha and Fate...

They looked even worse.

The pain that they felt, it was amplified and magnified through Vivio, and that caused Signum to hurt worse. At least Zafira hadn't removed himself from the little girl's side very often since she heard the news. About the only time that he did was when Hayate was around.

She took a look around and nodded at Chrono, who was walking up to deliver some words reflecting his thoughts and feelings on the fallen mage.

She wasn't surprised to see Erio and Caro there, the fact that Megane and Lutecia were sitting there next to them was slightly surprising, but all four of them looked depressed and saddened by Yuuno's passing.

_Yuuno, at least you had a lot of people who cared for you._ She thought to herself softly.

* * *

And that's ending A.

I don't know if Hayate can use the bomb version of Starlight Breaker, but since she had Diabolic Emission, I'm going to assume that she could still do it if she wanted to.


	3. Ending B

This is the other ending of "Pain".

RadiantBeam and myself own nothing.

Just... Chalk up some of the more improbable things to "Rule of Drama" here.

* * *

Ending B:

Signum simply chuckled, smiling slightly.

The smile on her face faded as Shamal came out onto the training grounds. "Shamal? What's wrong?"

The blond shook her head, sighing. "Nothing. Yuuno's still in critical condition, but..."

"But..." Vita worried nervously.

She sighed and smiled lightly. "I think, the worst has passed. We're hopeful, and he's on 24-hour watch right now, just to make sure that he'll recover."

Vita sighed, smiling lightly. "Oh thank god..." She slumped slightly, a giant weight pulled off of her shoulders.

"Not yet," Shamal warned. "He's still critical."

"But if he survives the night, he's all clear?"

"Either he survives the night or wakes up sometime today." Shamal smiled tiredly. "Until then, 24 hour watch."

Signum nodded and smirked lightly. "I think he'll be okay. He's one tough cookie. A lot like his lovers."

Vita laughed lightly, it was nice to laugh again. "He'd have to be, to survive both Nanoha and Fate."

Shamal gave Vita a scolding look. "Don't tell me you _believe_ those horror stories you hear?"

Vita just shrugged and smirked.

Signum sighed.

"Shouldn't someone contact Fate and that thing to tell them the good news?"

"Back to that 'thing', eh?" Vita murmured.

Signum shrugged slightly. "It's better than the nickname you gave her... Calling her a devil."

"Hey! She looked like one, walking out of that inferno unharmed! Full of power, surrounded by fire and unharmed? You tell me that doesn't sound like a devil to you!"

Shamal gave a light cough to bring the pair back to reality.

Vita scowled slightly; she wasn't looking forward to trying to get through their Devices again. "Can't you do it?"

"Sorry. I have to stay with Yuuno. If something changes, I... well."

At that, the mood shifted.

"Got it," Vita mumbled.

Vita sighed before looking at Signum. "Should we head to their home?"

"What makes you think that they're there?" Signum asked her shorter companion.

"Managed to get that much information from Raising Heart before she cut me off."

Signum nodded. "Ah. Very well then, lead the way."

"Wait, why me?" Vita asked, blinking in confusion.

"Because you need closure and you need, even if it's not necessary, forgiveness from Yuuno's lovers."

As much as Vita hated to admit it, she knew Signum was right; she needed, desperately, to look into Fate's eyes, into Nanoha's eyes, and see forgiveness there.

That didn't change the fact that she would deny it until the day she died.

"Do I have to? I really, _really_ don't want to walk in on... that."

Signum chuckled and ruffled Vita's hair. "Why, afraid of getting ideas when you're alone with Master Hayate?"

"Urk!" Vita's eyes widened as she fell onto her butt. "What the hell, Signum?!"

The pink haired knight chuckled softly. "Well, that got a rise out of you."

"You... Signum!" Vita sputtered and glared at the pink haired knight.

"Shall we go now?" Signum asked, with a raised eyebrow.

"Fine..." Vita sighed, oddly feeling a lot better from the banter between them.

Shamal chuckled, watching the pair walk away. "I'll call you if anything changes," she promised, then paused. "Oh, and Signum, Vita..."

They both paused.

"Watch out for their flying tackles." Shamal smirked. "I don't think either of you would handle those as well as Yuuno does."

"What makes you think that they'll tackle us?" Vita asked as Shamal laughed slightly. "What did she mean?"

"We'll find out when we get there." Signum said with a shrug. "Well, get going."

Vita sighed and they left the field.

(---)

Vita and Signum found themselves in front of Nanoha, Yuuno, Fate and Vivio's home, before she rang the doorbell a few times. She sighed and waited for someone to answer the door.

She didn't have to wait long.

Much to Vita's ever-lasting relief, it didn't seem like she and Signum had interrupted anything; Nanoha and Fate were both clothed, out of their uniforms and wearing loose pants and shirts. "Signum, Vita," Fate said in greeting, opening the door wider as Nanoha peered at them, resting her chin on Fate's shoulder. "Come in, come in."

Even as Vita took her first step into the hallway, Signum spoke. "It's about Yuuno."

There had been a playful light in the eyes of the two female lovers, an air of happiness and brief contentment about them. At the mention of their male lover, it dropped instantly.

"What about Yuuno-kun?" Nanoha stepped to Fate's side, tightly gripping the blond's hand.

Remembering Shamal's warning, Signum motioned for them to head into the living room, giving the pair a chance to sit down before she broke the news.

"Yuuno relapsed not long after you both left," she said. "Apparently, he sustained serious damage to his Linker Core." She held up a hand to ward off questions.

Vita sighed. "Shamal managed to stabilize him," she said, "but she makes no promises. Right now he's under 24 hour surveillance."

"But, he's alive, right?" Fate asked, her eyes reflecting her worry as she squeezed Nanoha's hand.

"For now..." Vita said softly. "He's still in critical condition." She couldn't stand the look on their faces before she fell to her hands and knees, looking at the ground. "This is all my fault! Nanoha, Fate... I... I should have done more. I couldn't do enough." Tears were falling down her face now. "I promised you two that I would take care of him, but I couldn't keep that promise, all I can do is just be there when people that I'm supposed to protect get hurt. I'm so sorry!"

"Vita." Signum's voice was low, gentle; as gentle as her voice could ever be, in any case. Despite herself, though, she didn't move to the smaller Knight. It wasn't her place, and it wasn't what Vita needed.

Vita heard a rustle of movement and cringed, fully expecting the worst; she froze, blinking in confused shock as Nanoha knelt down and hugged her. "Nanoha?" she choked out.

"You were separated from him." Nanoha's voice was soft. "You got separated, right? You tried to get back to him as fast as you could, right? That's enough." She pulled back, smiling at Vita even as her eyes watered. "You did enough, Vita-chan, you and Arf-san both."

"But... I..." Vita was silenced with another hug that held her tightly.

"Vita-chan... I can never hate you for doing all that you did. But... You and Arf-san... You two saved Yuuno-kun's life." Nanoha pulled back, smiling, tears falling out of her eyes. "If you weren't there, doing what you could for him, he wouldn't even be able to rest and fight for life now. I can never thank you enough."

"Nanoha..." Vita shook and looked at Fate, who squeezed Vita's hand tightly. "F...Fate?"

Fate smiled, though she was fighting back tears just like Nanoha was.

"Arf said the same thing," she whispered. "You both did the best you could, Vita. And Yuuno... he did what he thought was right." She swallowed hard. "He knew the risks."

"But... I... I don't..."

Fate shook her head. "No, Vita... You are our dear, close friend and you did what you could to save his life. There is nothing to apologize for. I know that Yuuno doesn't hate you either."

"Stupid ferret never hates anyone." Vita muttered softly, but tears were still falling down her face as she nodded softly.

"Vita-chan, if you think that any of us hate you over this, you're wrong." Nanoha smiled, sniffling softly at the small redhead, trying to convey that she truly wasn't angry at her friend.

"N...Nanoha!" Vita cried and hugged her friend, sobbing heavily. "Thank you... Thank you... Thank you..."

Signum's eyes softened; her lips twitched into a small, slight smile. Yes, she thought with a sigh. Vita had needed this; perhaps more than she even realized.

Leaving Nanoha to comfort Vita, Fate looked at Signum and smiled weakly. "You said he's stabilized?"

"At the moment." Signum cleared her throat awkwardly, wanting to encourage but knowing the risks. "Shamal said no promises. He's under 24 hour watch right now, in case there's a change."

She hesitated.

"I... Shamal has a strict policy about visitors during surveillance, but... I could ask her to let you two in. If... you want to see him."

Fate shook her head and sighed. "No... It... It would be better if he didn't have visitors right now. If something does happen, we would only be in the way." She sighed softly. "But, thank you for coming over here and telling us."

Signum nodded and placed a hand on her shoulder. "I can't imagine how hard it is for you."

"More than you know." Fate said, biting her lower lip. "Where's Vivio?" She realized that her daughter wasn't there and she was getting this news. "She's not at the hospital still, is she? She's not alone, is she? Is she being looked after?"

"Amy has her." Vita spoke up, pulling away from Nanoha slightly, her face damp from the crying she had been doing. "I left Vivio with Amy, so she'll be okay."

Fate and Nanoha both sighed in relief. That was one less worry that they had.

"All right then, I'll head back." Signum rose. "If Shamal needs help, I... well, if she needs help," she said somewhat lamely. "Nanoha, Fate, if you change your minds, don't be afraid to come. I think..." Here, she hesitated. Did she really have the right to say this?

"Yes?"

"I think it would help him," she said at last. "In all the old Earth movies I've watched with Hayate, when people talk to another person in a coma, it helps them wake up." She cleared her throat again. "Shamal said he'd be stable if he survives the night, but she never mentioned anything about him waking up."

Vita smirked slightly at them. "Besides, I bet he would be really happy to know that you were there for him."

The two shared a look at each other and quirked a smile, did their friends have to make liars out of them?

(---)

"Yuuno-kun..." Nanoha smiled shakily. He looked so still, so quiet. If it wasn't for the heart monitor beeping every so often, she would assume he had just passed away.

Fate hung back, her gaze flickering between Nanoha and Yuuno; Nanoha to make sure she was controlling her fear, Yuuno to see if he'd wake up.

Moving timidly, Nanoha stepped closer to Yuuno; when no nurse or doctor magically appeared by her side to scold her, she swallowed hard and gently rested her hand against his chest.

His skin felt warm beneath her hand, full of life; his heartbeat was still going strong, even if it sounded slightly faded and seemed to falter from time to time.

Nanoha felt tears prick at her eyes. "Fate-chan," she murmured, turning to the blond and asking her to come with her eyes.

A moment later, Fate was there, squeezing the hand that was on Yuuno's chest, moving it slightly so she could feel. Closing her eyes slowly, she could feel the heartbeat there, giving her so much relief. "He's going strong."

"He's fighting for us, Fate-chan." At least Nanoha thought so. "Yuuno-kun... Please... I don't want our babies to not have a father. Please come back to us. I... I want to be able to come home every day and see my Yuuno-kun, my Fate-chan, our children... I want to come home and see that every day. To see our family happy and healthy. Please, Yuuno-kun..."

Fate swallowed quietly. She'd never been good at this, at expressing her emotions in words; Nanoha and Yuuno had always been expressive enough for them to understand her.

But she wanted, desperately, to try.

"Yuuno." For a moment, she didn't know what to say or how to say it, and decided to wing it. "Nanoha... pretty much said what I was thinking." She laughed softly. "But... please. Come back. I never... I never thought I could have you, or Nanoha." On his chest, she gave Nanoha's hand a squeeze. "I want... I want you to stay. With me. With us. Please, Yuuno."

"Yuuno-kun. I... I don't know if you can hear us, but, please, if you are awake, conscious somehow, please, just... Just give us a small sign." Nanoha squeezed Fate's hand. "You, Fate-chan, Vivio... The three of you are my life. If I lost any of you..." She trailed off when he didn't respond. "Please... Yuuno-kun, I love you."

"Nanoha..." Fate said softly as her hand squeezed Nanoha's. "Please, Yuuno, if not for us, then for Vivio's sake. She was so upset and sad when she found out you were hurt. Come back for her at least."

For a moment there was no response, no change; nothing, it seemed, to indicate that Yuuno had heard them, wherever he was. Other than his heartbeat, his breathing, he gave no indication of waking.

Nanoha's face crumbled; Fate saw it and felt her heart break, even as she searched for some sign of life on Yuuno's face. "Nanoha," she said softly.

Nanoha was just about to speak when she froze.

A soft groan echoed through the room; Yuuno shuddered once, winced, and seemed to be giving a godly effort to opening his eyes.

"Y...Yuuno-kun?" Nanoha's eyes watered as she looked at him.

"Nnngh... Nanoha... Did... Did you Starlight Breaker that semi that hit me?" He asked softly as he forced his eyes open slowly.

The two looked at him for a moment, before crying his name out and hugging his prone body, crying happily, tears falling down their faces as they called out his name.

If he'd had the strength, Yuuno would have liked to hug them back; they looked like they'd been through the gates of Hell. But he was in an incredible amount of pain, and still woozy.

"What... the hell happened?" His voice was weak, almost drowsy; his mind felt cloudy, and he couldn't collect his thoughts. "I... I felt fine when you visited earlier..."

All he remembered was feeling the pain in his chest, gasping, Vivio screaming his name and then... nothing but blackness.

Briefly he wondered if Fate and Nanoha had heard him; they were still clinging to him like they feared he'd die the moment they let him go.

"Nanoha..." He groaned lightly. "Fate... Please... What happened?"

It was almost a full minute before they looked up, their faces tear-streaked. Idly he realized that he had done nothing but cause worry and tears since he got together with them. The instant that he got out of here, he was going to take time off and take a vacation with the two of them and Vivio, go to a beach or something and spend time together.

"You had a relapse." Fate said softly. "Your Linker Core was damaged badly and you weren't stabilizing at all."

Yuuno blinked.

Damage to his Linker Core? Odd, he hadn't felt it...

Except... wait...

"Well." He sighed, and winced as the simple action sent pain lancing through his body. "That explains the brilliant explosion of pain and color before I got hit by the beam and started bleeding."

"Please, Yuuno-kun... Don't joke like that... We nearly lost you again..."

Nodding at the look in their eyes, Yuuno closed his eyes. "I'm going to request a transfer away from the front lines. The superiors need to really get their priorities straight when choosing missions for everyone." He said softly, his eyes closing. "My head's spinning."

Fate and Nanoha exchanged nervous, worried looks. Shamal said it would take at least 24 hours for Yuuno to stabilize. "Do you want us to leave?" Fate asked softly.

Yuuno shook his head, and immediately regretted it as pain exploded in his temples. "Stay," he said softly. "I don't want to go back to sleep. It was too hard to wake up."

He didn't want to say that he was worried that if he fell back to sleep his body might give up and just stay asleep.

"Okay..." They said softly.

They ended up talking about nothing and everything over the course of the night, only stopping when a doctor or Shamal came in to check up on Yuuno, to make sure that he was alright.

By her fifth visit, Shamal sighed and put her hands on her hips.

"All right, nothing against you three, but you all need sleep." Very gently, she pulled Nanoha and Fate away from Yuuno. "You two have been through a lot today, and you need to rest."

She gave Yuuno an eagle eye.

"And you, Yuuno, are still recovering. You need to sleep so your Linker Core has more energy to recover and function."

Shamal saw the fear in Yuuno's eyes and sighed. _You really do_, she said mentally, so Fate and Nanoha wouldn't hear. _I'll talk to them, all right? Go to sleep. You need it._

_You think so?_ He mentally said back at her, when she nodded, he sighed and closed his eyes. "Night..." He yawned, quickly passing into a deep, dreamless sleep.

"Shamal..." Nanoha looked at the doctor. "I... Please? Can we stay here tonight?"

"I'd have to get another couple of beds in here, and we can't spare any, Nanoha." Shamal said, sighing at the look on their faces. "Please, you two need to sleep in proper beds..." She walked up and put a hand on Nanoha's belly. "It will help these little guys grow properly."

Shamal never felt guilty over using the babies to get Fate and Nanoha to listen; or mainly Nanoha, as it usually was. In any case, it did the trick, even as she saw them both look reluctantly at the door after leaving the room.

"Shamal..."

"Yes?"

"He'll wake up again... right?"

"He needs more rest, Nanoha." Shamal said softly, patting the woman on the shoulder gently. "The mere fact that he woke up so fast is amazing in and of itself, but he needs more rest, a lot more." She quirked a small smile at Nanoha. "He's actually tougher than you. It took you three months before you woke up like he did."

It seemed to do the trick as both seemed to release a lot of tension. "Thank you, Shamal."

She shook her head. "No need to thank me. Now, you two, go home, go to bed and get some sleep." She frowned sternly at them both. "If you don't, I'll make sure to put binds on both of you until all you can do is rest. It's not healthy for your bodies to go so long without rest and sleep."

"If something happens," Fate began.

"I'll call you as soon as there's a change," Shamal promised. "And I'll let you both back in to see him first thing tomorrow. Now _go_. You need to rest. I'm sure Yuuno has enough energy to create some defensive binds if I give him a good reason."

At that, Nanoha and Fate both blushed.

(---)

A bit later, both Nanoha and Fate, in their pajamas, were laying on their bed, Nanoha cuddling up to Fate's side. "Fate-chan..."

"Nanoha?" Fate blinked as Nanoha kissed her on the lips. "Are you okay?"

"No..." She pouted sadly. "I'm sore, I'm upset, I'm tired, I want to run to Yuuno-kun and hold onto him all night, I want to make love to you all night," Fate blushed heavily as she heard that, "I want to take Raising Heart, find the people responsible for sending Yuuno-kun out on that mission and give them a Blaster 3 Starlight Breaker, I want to go to my mother and hold onto her or Miyuki or dad and just cry and I want..." She was cut off as Fate put a hand over her mouth.

"Thank you, Nanoha..." She smiled and kissed the brunette on the forehead. "I want to do the same."

"Fate-chan..." Nanoha whispered as the hand was removed from her mouth. She hugged Fate and cuddled against her. "I love you so much, Fate-chan."

"I love you too, Nanoha." Fate gently drew the brunette closer, smiling. She sighed. "What a day."

"Ne, Fate-chan..."

"Hmmm?"

"I was wondering if--"

Nanoha's thought was interrupted as a call screen popped up in front of them, asking for permission to put the call through. The pair shared a confused look before allowing the call through.

Nanoha blinked. "Hayate-chan?"

"Good, you two aren't asleep yet." Hayate smiled, but it was strained. "Tell me you managed to nap, at least a little."

"Some." Fate sat up slightly. "What's wrong?"

Hayate sighed. Of course they could tell, she thought.

"I'm holding Vita and Signum back by the collars of their shirts right now." She frowned. "Some scientists from the higher-ups are sniffing around for Yuuno. Something about studying the effects of a damaged Linker Core and its effects on the body. Extra bonus points because 'the specimen in question is still alive', as he so kindly put it."

"What?" The tone in their voices was deadly, silent and utterly terrifying. And it wasn't even directed at Hayate.

Rubbing her eyes, she nodded. "Yes. Vita and Signum both look ready to kill someone." Not that she blamed them, she wanted to go out in full battle garb and blast the whole group of idiots. "Zafira and Shamal are making sure that no one gets near Yuuno right now."

At that exact moment, Agito and Rein appeared by Hayate's side, arguing fiercely about something. Hayate ignored them, turning back to Fate and Nanoha. "I don't want you two to panic," she said. "We're holding it down here, but it might help to have you hanging around... as visual reminders."

Beside her, the argument between Agito and Rein got more heated.

"How are you even sure it's the same man? You said so yourself, you didn't recognize him!"

"I wouldn't forget that voice, that carelessness for life!" Agito exploded. "Who the hell looks down at a guy sound asleep and fighting for his life and says it'd be _so_ much easier to do the experiment if the damage had killed him?!!"

"They said _what_?" Hayate practically growled as she heard that last bit.

Still in a fury, Agito whirled to Hayate. "I know that man, dammit! He worked on me... before! If I hadn't been in the room, he would have pulled the damn life support plug!!"

An instant later, she noticed the screen. She paled. "Oh, crap," she whispered and trembled, looking at Nanoha and Fate, she now knew why they were so feared by the enemies of the TSAB.

"Hayate... We'll be down there in three minutes..." Fate said quietly as she held Bardiche, Nanoha holding Raising Heart. "If those men aren't gone, we're going to hit them with so much pain that they'll wish they were dead." She may have been pregnant, but she couldn't stand this.

"Nanoha-chan! Fate-chan! Stop!"

"Hayate-chan..." Nanoha's eyes softened as she looked at her friend. "We can't just..."

"I know!" Hayate took a deep breath and sighed out. "Just come down here, you two might be able to convince them to... Huh?" Hayate looked off-screen, her eyes widening. "Okay, you two, just hurry up down here, please?"

"Hayate?" Fate was worried now.

"We just some some reinforcements down here." She smiled tiredly.

"Reinforcements?"

"Just come on down. You'll see." Hayate chuckled.

As the screen clicked off, Nanoha could hear Hayate asking someone off-screen, "How did you convince _Nove_ to come?"

The two looked at each other before getting dressed and heading out.

(---)

When Nanoha and Fate got there, they weren't surprised to see Nove there, but Wendi, Cinque, Dieci and Subaru was a shocking surprise. "Ah..." Nanoha blinked in surprise, she didn't even know Subaru was in town.

"We heard that there was a problem at the hospital." Cinque said softly as she nodded to them.

Subaru saluted the both of them. "Admiral Lindy was talking to father when she got a message of a potential problem taking place and asked us to come with."

Nanoha blinked. "Where's Teana?" It seemed almost unnatural to see Subaru without Teana somewhere nearby.

"She's on her way." Subaru grinned. "She had to stop and pick up Erio and Caro. They'd just landed to visit when the news broke."

Now Fate blinked.

"Erio and Caro are coming?"

"They wanted to." Subaru nodded. "They even brought Megane and Lutecia with them."

"I'm glad." Fate sighed, blinking as she felt hands on her shoulders. Turning, she smiled at Lindy. "Mother..." She didn't waste any time hugging her. "Thank you ."

"It's okay, Fate-chan." The older woman said softly as she hugged her daughter. "I told you that my information network is the fastest around." She smirked slightly. "Oh, and that scientist that tried to pull the plug... Agito's having some fun with him."

Cinque got a small chuckle at hearing that. "I remember that guy. He and Scagiletti talked at times. I couldn't let him go."

Nove stared at Cinque. "You didn't," she said softly, wondering just how far the smallest of the former Numbers went.

Cinque smirked and shrugged. "Hey, it's not my fault the door was locked when he tried to get out," she replied, then looked at Shamal as she came outside to greet Nanoha and Fate. "You need to have your locks checked. I think they might click into place too easily."

Shamal returned Cinque's smirk. "I'll keep that in mind."

At that instant Teana appeared, flanked by Erio, Caro, Lutecia, and Megane. Nanoha knew the instant she arrived because she saw Subaru's eyes light up.

"TEA!"

"Subaru." Teana replied much more sedately, getting a soft pout from the purple-haired girl, before she turned to Nanoha, who had turned around and smiled at her. "I apologize for taking so long to get here."

Nanoha smirked slightly at her. "Not at all. I'm glad that you came." She really was, things might calm down with Teana there. At the very least, Cross Mirage could be very intimidating to look at.

"Fate-san..." Erio and Caro walked over to her cautiously, before hugging her tightly as she let go of Lindy.

Fate closed her eyes and hugged her children, just happy that they were there to give her support. "Thank you both." She whispered to them, making them both flush slightly.

Megane and Lutecia hung back slightly; both looked nervous, but it was clear that they intended to help any way that they could. Smiling at them, Nanoha stepped forward to greet them. "Thank you for coming," she said softly. "It helps."

Megane smiled slightly in return, but Lutecia shrugged. "Caro and Erio care about him," she said simply. At that, the pair flushed even deeper.

"Mou, Tea..." Subaru pouted as Teana walked towards her. "Couldn't you be a little happier to see me? I know circumstances aren't the best, but..."

Without a single word, Teana gripped Subaru's collar and yanked her into a kiss that had her sisters making wolf whistles and cat calls.

Dieci looked at Nove, they both had a small smirk on their faces as they looked at the scene. "Reminds you of anything?" Dieci asked, causing Nove to blink at her.

"Nope."

Dieci leaned in and whispered softly. "How about you and Wendi?" She knew that Wendi wouldn't hear it, since both she and Nove could barely hear anything with the background noise going on.

Nove went stiff as a board and twitched slightly. "What the hell?" She hissed as Dieci shrugged, smirking lightly.

Sein was right, it was fun to tease her sisters about that.

"All right, everyone." As much as she was enjoying seeing her friends like this, Shamal knew they had more important matters. "Hayate wanted to talk to you all herself, but she's busy fighting off a few nosy scientists who can't keep their hands to themselves. Last I checked, I think Miyuki managed to run one of them off with a wooden practice sword."

Nanoha blinked, awed. "Onee-chan's here?" she murmured.

Lindy smiled at her. "I ran into her on the way here, she was bringing some get well soon stuff for Yuuno when she ran into me and followed."

Nanoha smiled, relaxing a bit more after hearing that.

Teana chuckled slightly. "Well, I'm pretty sure having an entire brigade of bodyguards would keep anyone at bay."

"I hope so." Shamal said as she looked at Nanoha and Fate. "You two still haven't gotten any rest, have you?"

"We were about to when we heard about this commotion." Fate said as she let go of Caro and Erio, both of them still hovering around their mother protectively.

Shamal nodded and rubbed her eyes tiredly. "I don't know who's doing what or why things are the way they are right now, I won't pretend to know. But I'm sure that..."

_"ARRRRRGH!"_

"What was that?!" Teana asked, her eyes wide.

She wasn't the only one wondering.

Cinque looked down the hallway and smirked. "I think Agito's getting some payback."

There was a long pause.

"Should we stop her?"

Another long pause; Shamal smirked and shook her head. "Let her have fun," she said lightly. "We have bigger fish to fry."

Shamal hoped Yuuno was sleeping through all this. Nanoha and Fate were already agitated enough; seeing their male lover up and about when he was still so weak would be the final straw.

The last thing she wanted to do was cause a miscarriage due to stress.

"I believe I can finally say what's going on." Lindy said, catching everyone's attention.

Clearing her throat, she took a deep breath. "As most of you probably guessed, there's a lot of secrets with the upper brass of the TSAB." Seeing nods around, she continued. "This is mostly to make sure that things can get done and people can go about their daily lives without worrying about things one way or another." There were a lot of secrets that she knew, some she didn't, and others she wish she had never found out. "The High Council having Jail Scagiletti running around and the late Regisus's use of him to make Combat Cyborgs was just one secret."

"Question!" Wendi raised her hand, getting Lindy to nod at her. "Wasn't the research done to make all cyborgs illegal?"

"Unfortunately, yes. That's what makes many of the secrets so bad." Hell, her former colleague Gil had horrible secrets himself, she still couldn't believe that he would risk so much on something that had no guarantee to work. Still, it was better than anything she could have done at the time. "The scientist that Agito is currently showing her displeasure to is another nasty secret." Seeing the blinks, she sighed heavily. "There were a lot more remnants from Ancient Belka than are publicly known. And the Bureau authorized full research into them, no matter the consequences, to find out just what the remnants could do."

Shamal's eyes widened. "Wait, I always thought that was secret and illegal. You're telling me that Agito's torture was authorized?"

"As much as I hate to admit it, yes, it was," Lindy confessed. "I myself didn't know all the details until the JS incident was settled. It seems that whoever approved that little adventure also turned a blind eye to Jail's raising and training Lutecia."

At that, Megane protectively pulled her daughter closer.

Lindy cleared her throat to continue. "As it is, I can only guess this man was pulled from the project and assigned to a new one to keep him quiet."

Wendi's hand shot up again. "Question!"

Lindy nodded again.

"What does any of this have to do with damaged Linker Cores? That's what they want Yuuno for now, right?"

"Damaged Linker Cores are one of the top threat to mages." Lindy sighed. "It's rare for someone to sustain damage and last for more than 24 hours."

"So, they want to turn Yuuno-kun into a test subject?" Nanoha asked, her knuckles white as she clenched her fists tightly.

Lindy was glad that Teana and Subaru both got to Nanoha and reassured her quietly, she really didn't think that the younger woman could take too much more stress right now. "Sadly, yes."

"And doing so would let them see a damaged Linker Core in action." Dieci muttered, frowning softly. "If it was known then... Then they could stop other people who got their cores damaged from dying easier because there would be more data on it." She held up her hands as people looked at her. "I'm not saying we should let them, I'm just saying what they're probably thinking." The number of glares at her sent shivers down her spine, that was scary!

"Fate-san..." Erio said softly to his mother. "You won't have to worry about Yuuno-san. No one here will let them hurt him."

"Thank you, Erio." Fate smiled and kissed him on the forehead, getting a blush from him. The only thing keeping anyone from making teasing comments was the weight of the situation. "Mother, please, is there anything we can do?"

Lindy sighed.

"As tempted as I am to just leave Miyuki at the door, beating off anyone who comes by, with Hayate ready to use the Tome of the Night Sky if needed, it's not that simple." She hesitated. "Dieci makes a very good point."

"Thank you!" Much to Dieci's everlasting relief, the glares stopped.

"And I hate to say it, but you know Yuuno would agree with the idea if he was conscience enough to have a say in anything." Lindy met Fate's gaze gently. "You and Nanoha both know that, Fate."

"But, he's not conscious." Nove spoke up, getting attention drawn to her. "I... I don't think that it's right to have experiments done to someone when they can't say yes or no if they have a choice." Too much of that happened in her life, to her, to the people around her, and such a thing was just painful when the person thought about it. "Couldn't they just use the observations that Shamal has on him?"

"Shamal?" Fate and Nanoha looked at the sheepish blond.

"Sorry, but I have his Linker Core under surveillance to make sure that it recovers and, well, the recordings that are being done are incredible." Plus it was a lot better than what those scientists were talking about doing, but she was _not_ going to bring that up around Nanoha or Fate at the moment, they didn't need it.

Nove blinked as Wendi wrapped an arm around her shoulder, hugging her softly. She sighed and tried to relax, but it wasn't easy. She really wanted to go and beat up on that scientist as well.

Lindy noticed the look in Shamal's eyes and made a mental note to speak to her later; she had a feeling things were going on, things Nanoha and Fate wouldn't like to hear. "How has he been?" she asked.

Shamal sighed.

"Still sleeping, which is good. I thought he'd wake up a few times, but he keeps drifting away before he can even open his eyes." She scowled. "Having those scientists around doesn't help as it is. The way they look at him..."

Lindy nodded and rubbed her eyes as she looked around, the exhaustion was starting to catch up on some of the people in the room, not that she blamed any of them, it was almost... She glanced at her watch and her eyes widened. "Oh my." She got a look from some people. "It's almost four in the morning." She smiled at everyone. "While I know that some of us can go awhile without sleep, there are some of us who do need some sleep." Granted everyone in the room could go days without sleep if they needed to, none of them ever would want to risk performance over missing a day or two of sleep if they could afford to.

"Unfortunately, there's no extra beds." Shamal knew this, she had looked around when Nanoha and Fate were at the hospital, otherwise those two would be in the room with Yuuno right now. "And I'm not letting anyone sleep on the floor or in the waiting room." Which was too small for them anyway.

"I don't feel comfortable with leaving Yuuno-kun alone." Nanoha said softly.

"I'll stay here and guard him." Nove spoke up, getting a nod from the rest of her sisters. "Nanoha-san, Fate-san, you two need your rest, so do the rest of you." She blushed slightly at the looks of bemusement on her face. "Look, I know that I'm younger than some of you, but we can stay up for a week straight before we start to feel tired if nothing happens." Granted none of them ever were forced to go that long. Insane or not, Jail did actually take care of them. It was the only reason that they had stuck with him so long.

"Shamal..." Lindy whispered to the blond as she worked her way over. Seeing her nod, the two slipped off and behind another door, one where Dieci was standing by and she spoke in low tones to the doctor. "Is something wrong?"

In the other room, Lutecia asked Megane if she could keep the Numbers company while they guarded Yuuno.

Shamal sighed heavily and rubbed her eyes, checking to make sure that no one was within hearing distance. "I knew you had to be cold-hearted to be a scientist for the higher-ups," she murmured, "but this is horrible. None of them look at Yuuno and see a man fighting for his life. They just see an experiment, a chance to solve a problem." She smirked coldly. "Agito's lovely young man isn't the only one who thinks it'd be easier if he was dead. I've lost count of how many bribes I've been offered if Yuuno's plug was 'accidentally' unplugged or his body 'was destabilized' again."

Lindy rubbed her forehead, this was very problematic. "Thank you for not telling them."

Shamal nodded, grimacing. "I think if Nanoha or Fate went through any more stress that they'd miscarriage right now." In fact, she was almost certain of it by now.

Lindy didn't need to know that if such a thing happened that Nanoha and Fate would never forgive themselves over it. "I agree. Keep this to yourself, okay?"

Shamal nodded, she wouldn't even tell Hayate about this. "Lindy, look, I know that experiments to find out limits are important but..."

"I know, there's no way to know if they would stop before going too far..."

"Nanoha and Fate..." Shamal sighed softly. "They don't need this. They lost their childhoods way too soon because of the magic that they have, they should at least be allowed to have a family." Especially now that they were expecting children.

Lindy nodded quietly; she knew what Shamal was leaving unsaid, and agreed with her completely.

A moment later Shamal went stiff, feeling a change in magical pressure. "Oh, don't tell me," she growled, before leaving the room.

"Shamal?!"

Cursing mentally Lindy shot after the other woman, hoping to keep the crowd at ease.

(---)

Shamal moved quickly, almost like flying down the hallway. The scene she reached made her want to curse out loud.

One of the doctors had been thrown against the wall, eyes wide and face pale. Standing between him and a shaken Miyuki was Yuuno; he looked dead on his feet, weaving, barely even full strength, but she saw the shield fading.

"Dammit, Yuuno!"

Yuuno smiled shakily at Miyuki. "Now I'm in trouble," he murmured. "I'm sorry, Shamal, this man was getting rough with Miyuki. She doesn't have magical powers."

Shamal rubbed her forehead and pushed Yuuno back onto the bed. "I'm glad that you're okay, but dammit, you're still weak! You yell at Nanoha for pushing herself too hard."

"Eh heh... Sorry..."

Lindy frowned at the doctor. "Just what were you thinking?"

"That studying him would help our medical scientists get a better understanding of how to fix damaged Linker Cores?"

Nove frowned as she walked in after hearing that. "I thought something happened to Yuuno-san, I didn't know that some rat was trying to bite off more than he could chew." At least Nanoha and Fate had been dragged off by Caro and Erio, so they had missed this. "You know what, Shamal, I say you should be the only one allowed in and out of here."

"I'm beginning to think that way myself, Nove." Shamal sighed and frowned at the doctor. "This is my patient, not yours, mine, now I would kindly ask of you to not bother him anymore."

The doctor scowled at that, struggling to his feet. "I did nothing wrong!" he retorted. "I merely asked if I could visit him for a few minutes, and the girl refused to let me in! I simply moved her aside--"

"You threw her into the wall," Yuuno called from the room. "With your Device. She was bleeding."

At that, Shamal glanced at Miyuki, and winced when she saw the red blood soaking through the back of her shirt. "He did that?"

"Nicked me with his Device." Miyuki shrugged. "It's shallow. I've had worse."

Shamal sighed.

"You're bleeding too much for it to be shallow. Nanoha's going to kill you when she sees it."

Shamal went over to Miyuki and helped her up. "Let me see it." She said as Miyuki turned around and lifted up her shirt. Shamal went quiet and frowned, looking at the doctor. "I do hope that you can live without being able to practice medicine."

"What right do you have to threaten me with that? You aren't any higher up than I am!"

"But I am." Lindy said, frowning as she stepped forward, the doctor looked at her, his eyes slightly wide. "Right now, good sir, I am afraid that you are no longer needed here at this hospital, nor will you be needed anywhere else."

"But..."

"Just shut up." Shamal ignored it as she went about casting healing magic on Miyuki's back, getting the blood to stop. Well, she had been right, it was kind of shallow, but it was a lot still. Shamal knew that there was no way that Miyuki was going to get away without having scar damage from this. "Right now, there's an injured man in this room, a woman who you injured and a very, VERY stressed out admiral, if you want to have any chance of having any sort of career after this stunt, you had better give me your name tag, put in your resignation papers and never step foot inside this hospital again, do you understand me?"

The doctor slipped away, grumbling.

Miyuki sighed. "I'm sorry," she said softly. "He said a few of the government officials hanging around asked him to get in, but you said no visitors."

"It's not your fault. You did the best you could." Shamal chuckled weakly. "Miyuki, how do you plan to hide this scar from Nanoha? She asked for you to come over tonight."

Miyuki shrugged. "I'll think of something," she murmured. "It's not a big deal. I'm amazed Yuuno could make a shield in his condition, though." She frowned. "He looked ready to keel over."

"Hey!" Yuuno's insulted voice rang out from the room, making the three women chuckle.

There was a sound coming from outside, Nove opened the door and cursed loudly. "Don't they ever give up?!"

"Guess not!" Wendi's voice, a bit _too_ cheerful piped in. "Oh, wait, these guys... I know these guys."

"You do?" Nove blinked as she opened the door, there were a few of the government officials on the floor, but they looked a bit different than the ones that were trying earlier.

"Yeah, these are the guys that gave us our evaluations back before letting us go, remember?"

"You kicked me in the crotch on purpose, didn't you?" The one curled in a ball by Wendi's feet groaned.

She shrugged. "Eh, I needed to kick something. Why are you here?"

"To... Urgh... Get some data from the labs here in the hospital..."

Shamal started laughing lightly. "Sorry about that, we're just a little on edge."

"I... Figured..." The man groaned and stood up unsteadily. "The labs... Are down this hallway... Right?"

"Yep, just keep going and take a left."

"T...Thank you."

Miyuki blinked and looked at Shamal as the doctor was fixing her up. "What was that about?"

"Oh, just some lab work done on various injured and sick people in the last few weeks. The medical group comes in every month and takes our lab results to study and see what they can do about it in the future."

Lindy blinked at her. "Then why didn't they wait for Yuuno to get done and just take his data?"

Shamal shrugged slightly. "Guess they're impatient, plus there's some things we can't release. Data such as his might fall into that."

"Why?"

Shamal shrugged. "Number of reasons, really. Probably the most likely reason would be that if more people had access to how Yuuno ended up here, then we might have even more mages ending up here due to damaged linker cores."

Miyuki frowned. "There's more to it than that, isn't there?"

"You're Nanoha's sister, all right." Shamal smiled slightly. "I was trying not to mention it..."

"Mention what?"

Lindy, Wendi, and Nove looked at Shamal. Miyuki would have done the same, but her injury was still being tended to.

Shamal sighed.

"There are... certain advantages to taking Yuuno as he is now, alive and recovering. It's true that the study team wants to find a way to prevent damage to Linker Cores, but they also want to study the exact _effect_ that damage has on the body. Basically they want to know a mage's breaking point when they have damage, how well they do in battle or in daily life, so on and so forth. Since Yuuno is still alive, they could conduct those kind of experiments and see right away how the changes affect him."

Yuuno twitched slightly. "Uh, do I get any say in this?"

"You wouldn't." Shamal sighed heavily. "That's all I can do for healing, Miyuki." She went and got some bandages. "You'll have to heal naturally on your own."

"I know, thanks, Shamal."

Nove twitched and snarled. "They're no better than Scagiletti... No, wait, they're worse. At least his subjects were dead before." Then again, considering what he did to her and her sisters, he was still inexcusable. "Why does the TSAB have people like that on board anyway?"

"Necessary evil, I'm afraid." Yuuno sighed and looked at Shamal. "Can I go home tomorrow, please?"

"If you don't have a relapse by noon, I won't have too many reasons to hold you. Plus I can put a bell around your neck to monitor you until you fully recover." She smirked at him. "Maybe you should be a ferret while you wear the bell?"

At the mention of his ferret form, Yuuno shuddered. "No," he said, a little too quickly. "No ferret form."

Lindy raised a brow. "I don't remember you hating that form, Yuuno."

"I don't hate it... just one time, I used it while Nanoha and Fate were around, and... yeah," he mumbled awkwardly, leaving the rest to the imagination.

Miyuki snorted quietly with laughter and stood. "Well, I have to head out," she said. "Nanoha's probably sitting on the couch waiting for me." She smiled at Lindy. "You coming, Lindy-san?"

"Sure thing." Lindy smiled at her and walked with her. "Are you going to change your shirt?"

Miyuki shrugged. "I've got some clothes, I can change."

Shamal looked at Yuuno, smirking lightly. "You're just saying that because she bit you one time while dreaming and thinking you were a baked potato."

"Don't remind me." Yuuno groaned, why would Nanoha dream about eating food in her sleep, he wasn't sure.

Shamal laughed lightly and walked out with Nove. "Just call if you need anything, Yuuno."

He sighed and slumped down. "What a night."

Outside, Shamal shook her head. She was really thankful that she could go a long time without getting too tired at that moment. "Please make sure that no one gets in until I come back." The younger cyborgs nodded as Shamal left them.

Dieci looked at her sisters, then at the room, then at her sisters. "Um..."

"Yeah?"

"What do you think will happen now?"

Wendi shrugged, she wasn't sure. "Dunno, I hope someone tries to go in again though." Kicking that guy had been a lot of fun.

"I don't." Nove muttered as she sat next to Wendi and leaned against her slightly. "Dealing with idiots makes me irritable." She hoped that Vivio would show up in the morning. The little girl really did make her day seem brighter, no matter what.

(---)

Wendi, Dieci, and Nove weren't surprised to see Nanoha, Fate and Miyuki right away that morning, even if the three of them still looked very tired, it was after eight and they were up. "Morning." They said as they walked in. "Where's Cinque?"

"Getting us some breakfast." Wendi smiled lightly, her smile increased as she saw Vivio running to them. "Hey, kiddo."

"Hi, Wendi, Nove, Dieci!" She smiled brightly. She had heard her papa was awake and just got extra tired after yesterday.

"Did you have fun at Amy's yesterday?"

Vivio nodded enthusiastically. "Yeah, yeah! And then Aunt Miyuki came over and spent the night, but Nanoha-mama was mad at her because she was bleeding."

Miyuki laughed sheepishly and rubbed the back of her neck, wilting slightly as Nanoha aimed another glare in her general direction.

Wendi chuckled and ruffled Vivio's hair. "Tell your mama your aunt got a battle scar protecting your papa," she said lightly. "Nothing to be ashamed of."

"I hear voices," Yuuno called. "Can I get up?"

"Shamal said stay in bed, ferret boy."

"Vita's in there with him?" Suddenly, Nanoha felt a lot better, knowing that Vita would rather die than let Yuuno get hurt again.

Nove nodded and rubbed her head. "She hit each of us over the head and said that she was going to make sure that nothing that could get by us could get to him." She grumbled something about Graf Eisen not being meant to be used the way it was used.

Vivio grabbed Nove's hand and smiled at her. "Aunt Vita's just happy that papa's safe."

Nove chuckled lightly and picked up the little girl. "Yeah, I know... Still hurts though."

"When can he be released?"

"In a few hours." Cinque answered Fate's question as she rolled in a large cart full of food. "Breakfast time."

"I stood up fine last night, Vita," Yuuno grumbled from inside the room.

"You were dead on your feet. Down means down! Oi, stay! Don't make me use Graf Eisen on you!"

Walking up to greet Nanoha and Fate, Shamal cringed. "He's been antsy all night," she murmured. "Didn't sleep well after that whole incident." She looked at Miyuki. "Lift up your shirt."

Miyuki raised a brow.

"I need to check your injury."

Miyuki nodded and turned around, pulling her shirt up, but leaving her front covered. "Sure..."

Shamal nodded as she took the bandages off, they were red, but not horribly so. "Well, still looks bad." She said softly as she cast some more healing magic over it, to stimulate the healing better. "Just don't do anything strenuous for awhile, you'll be fine."

"Of course, mother." Miyuki said, getting laughs from everyone as they settled down to eat some of the food.

"Shamal, can Yuuno-kun come home?"

"I just want to be safe, that's all, Nanoha. I need to get some observation equipment and put on him to watch him for awhile. I think he'll be okay, he just needs to take it easy." At least he could still walk after that injury, which was more than Nanoha could say for herself when she had gotten badly injured.

"Besides," Shamal said with a chuckle, "Vita's having so much fun with him right now."

Remembering the argument they'd heard in the room, Miyuki chuckled while Nanoha and Fate exchanged sheepish looks.

"Yuuno-papa can leave today?" Vivio asked after finishing up her pancakes. She much prefered Nanoha-mama or Aunt Hayate's cooking to this stuff, it was bland, but it filled her.

"Yes." Shamal smiled as she got really excited. "We just need to make sure that he won't pass out on us, make sure that he's got something monitoring him so that he won't get worse, and he can go..." She smirked at Nanoha and Fate. "I suggested a bell around him in his other form... He said something about walking in on you two." She got a laugh as the two of them blushed heavily. "That's gotta be a heck of a story to hear."

"When Vivio isn't around," Nanoha promised as Fate rested her head on her shoulder to hide her blush.

Miyuki slanted her sister a narrow-eyed look. "You never told me about that one."

Shamal chuckled.

"Well, our second option is to Superglue Vita to Yuuno's side, but I don't think he'd appreciate it."

Well, that and Shamal knew that Vita didn't relax too much at night unless she was sleeping with Hayate. The girl never missed an opportunity to sleep with Hayate every chance she got, not that their mistress discouraged her. There were times that Vita's devotion to Hayate was a bit more than platonic, but Shamal would never ask that.

"Four hours is awhile..." Nanoha muttered, but she could wait. It just got boring waiting those four hours.

Shamal laughed softly. "Well, you two didn't have to come straight here, you know."

"That's what I said," Miyuki mumbled, wincing as her wound throbbed briefly.

"We were worried." Fate said, smiling as Vivio took her dirty dishes from her. "Too much happened last night."

Shamal nodded as she finished up working on Miyuki's back. "Nove, will you get Vita to give you some bandages? She knows where they're at in that room."

"Sure."

Shamal smiled as Nove got her some bandages. Maybe she could convince Nanoha, Fate and Yuuno to take a vacation when this was over, they needed one.

After several minutes, Vita stalked out of the room. "For the record, I tried," she growled. She jabbed a finger at Nanoha. "Why couldn't you just run off with Fate? She's much less stubborn than the moron behind me."

The "moron behind her" was Yuuno; looking pale, still a little shaky, but fully dressed except for his bare feet, leaning slightly against the doorway.

It took less than a second for him to be grabbed and held by both Nanoha and Fate, fussing over him as he leaned on them. "Sorry..." He muttered before giving each of them a kiss.

Vivio was holding onto Yuuno's legs. "Papa... Can you come home?"

Shamal sighed and shook her head. "I can't, in good conscious let him go home just yet..." The looks on their faces was tearing at her heart, but she couldn't not yet. "Vita, go get a wheelchair for him."

The redhead nodded and took off.

"Shamal?"

"I can't let him go out of the hospital, but I know you want to spend some time with him, so the very least I can do is let you four walk around..." She smirked as they thanked her. "But you're going to have some guards... Nove, Cinque, Wendi, Dieci... Any of you care to help out?"

It pleased Shamal immensely when all four stepped forward without hesitation.

"What about me?" Miyuki asked.

"Down, girl, I still need to check your wound." Shamal smiled at the small family. "I know you want to spend time together, but don't push him too hard. He's still recovering."

* * *

This chapter was emotionally draining.

Lutecia and Megane were staying at Hayate's place and were going to show up later, Subaru and Teana were on their way. Sorry that I didn't cover that in the chapter.


End file.
